Love & Hip Hop
A reality franchise chronicling hip hop lives and careers.
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Love & Hip Hop is a media franchise of reality television series broadcast on VH1, MTV and BET that documents the personal and professional lives of hip hop and R&B musicians, performers, managers, and record producers in various U.S. metropolitan areas. The original installment premiered on March 6, 2011, and its success led to spin-offs set in Atlanta, Hollywood, and Miami. The franchise has become one of the highest rated unscripted series in cable television history, known for its sprawling ensemble cast of over 250 members, including notable figures such as Jim Jones, Remy Ma, and Cardi B.
Franchise history
In 2006, rapper Jim Jones pitched a reality show about himself to VH1. Jim Ackerman, then senior vice president of development and production, connected him with producers Stefan Springman and Toby Barraud of NFGTV. They made an 11-minute demo called Keeping Up with the Joneses, featuring Jones, his longtime girlfriend Chrissy Lampkin, and his mother Nancy. VH1 wasn't sure viewers would stick with the idea long-term, so Jones's manager, Yandy Smith, reached out to Mona Scott-Young, her former boss at Violator, to reshape the show.
The focus shifted to Chrissy Lampkin and her friends, inspired by the female-led reality shows popular at the time. In April 2010, VH1's development report first mentioned the series under the working title Diary of a Hip Hop Girlfriend. On January 4, 2011, VH1 announced Love & Hip Hop would premiere on March 6, 2011, as an eight-episode run. The cast included Chrissy, Jim Jones, his mother Nancy, Olivia Longott and her manager Rich Dollaz, Swizz Beatz's ex-wife Mashonda Tifrere, and stylist Emily Bustamante, who is the mother of Fabolous's son.
The season later grew to nine episodes to include a reunion special on May 16, 2011. Jon Caramanica of The New York Times liked how the show broke down rappers' public images and praised its slick, stylish shots of women driving fancy cars alone, but he criticized the unnecessary filler drama. Other reviewers agreed, saying the endless petty arguments and trashy behavior felt too much like The Real Housewives and weakened the show's message. On May 25, 2011, Love & Hip Hop got a second season, which started on November 14, 2011.
New cast members included Kimbella Vanderhee, Juelz Santana's girlfriend, and Yandy Smith, with Teairra Marí and video vixen Erica Mena in supporting roles. The second season pulled in an average of 2.8 million viewers per episode, making it VH1's highest-rated series in more than three and a half years.
Proposed spin-offs
Mona Scott-Young has been talking about bringing the Love & Hip Hop franchise to new cities since 2013, naming Chicago, New Orleans, Detroit, and Houston as possibilities. In early 2016, reports surfaced that spin-offs in Miami and Houston were being prepped, with casting auditions already underway. Scott-Young quickly shut down rumors about a New Orleans version, saying she would like to make it happen but that no casting or filming was currently taking place there.
The planned Houston edition had a cast that included Jhonni Blaze, Kirko Bangz, Kat St. John, Just Brittany, Nessacary, J. Prince Jr, Propain, the Sauce Twinz, the Charlo Brothers, DJ Eric, Lil' Keith, and Mehgan James. But production hit a wall in June 2016, when filming was stopped indefinitely because of safety issues—several shoots had been shut down by fights among cast members and interference from local residents. A year later, in July 2017, Scott-Young expressed her affection for Houston, noting that the team had gone there to cast and might return someday.
In 2021, VH1 disclosed that Megan Thee Stallion had tried out for Love & Hip Hop: Houston before she became famous. Back in 2014, Tammy Rivera and Waka Flocka Flame said they were leaving Love & Hip Hop: Atlanta to headline their own show, Meet the Flockas, but that project never came together; Rivera rejoined the main Atlanta cast in 2016. Waka confirmed in October 2017 that Meet the Flockas was in the works with Scott-Young producing. Around the same time, in July 2017, Safaree Samuels announced his own spin-off, Wild Safaree.
Neither show ever made it to television. Instead, Waka and Tammy ended up on We TV programs like Marriage Boot Camp: Hip Hop Edition, Waka & Tammy Tie The Knot, and Growing Up Hip Hop: Atlanta. In February 2019, Solo Lucci revealed plans for a dating spin-off called I Love Lucci, hosted by Ray J and produced by Scott-Young, but it also never aired, and whether it was meant to be part of the Love & Hip Hop universe remains uncertain.
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Sources
Compiled from Wikipedia and the sources listed below. Text from Wikipedia is available under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is adapted from it.
- Wikipedia: Love & Hip Hop (CC BY-SA 4.0).
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