Amanda Seales Leaves Fox’s The Real After 6 Months, Hints There’s a Lack of Black Voices at the Top
Amanda Seales has left her job as a cohost on the Fox talk show The Real.
Seales joined cohosts Loni Love, Tamera Mowry-Housley, Adrienne Bailon, and Jeannie Mai on the daytime talk show in January 2020, replacing Tamar Braxton, who was fired back in 2016. When Seales was hired, Telepictures executive vice president and general manager Donna Redier Linsk said, “Her unique voice at the table will add new dimensions to the conversation and, with the continued support of our partners at Fox, will guarantee a bright future for years to come.”
Now, just six months later, Seales has chosen to part ways with the show, which describes itself as "led by bold, diverse, and outspoken hosts" who "unapologetically say what women are actually thinking" on its website. The Insecure actor broke the news that she has not renewed her contract on June 2 while on an Instagram Live with Hamilton actor and activist Brandon Victor Dixon. She explained that there were not enough Black voices "at the top."
"I have arrived because my contract is up at The Real, and I did not renew it because it doesn’t feel good to my soul to be at a place where I cannot speak to my people the way they need to be spoken to,” she explained to Dixon. “And where the people who are speaking to me in disparaging ways are not being handled.”
“I’m not in a space where I can, as a full Black woman, have my voice and my coworkers also have their voices and where the people at the top are not respecting the necessity for Black voices to be at the top too,” she continued. “So you reach a point—even when it just comes to Hollywood in general. You’ve seen me transform into a way where I just can’t function at this place the same way. They’re planting white beans in my soil.”
Seales, who also hosts the game show Smart Funny & Black as well as the podcast Small Doses, is not concerned about the next step in her career. “I’ll find the bread in a manner that serves me,” she said.
Seales took to Instagram Live for a one-hour conversation with Dixon to discuss the aftermath of the George Floyd murder at the hands of police officers and the continued protests throughout the country. "Speaking on practical ways to move toward and embrace the mental elevation, economic independence, and political awareness needed for REVOLUTIONARY CHANGE," she explained in the caption. You can watch their entire talk, below.
Glamour is reaching out to the show for comment and will update when we've heard back.
Originally Appeared on Glamour
