TAYLOR FRANKIE PAUL SHOCKER | SLOMW News with Kate Casey

Reality with the King is hosted by me, Carlos King. I'm an executive producer who have produced some of your favorite shows from the Real Housewives of Atlanta, New Jersey, and my own creation, the Love and Marriage franchise and Bell Collective. Every episode, we recap reality television from the Real Housewives franchise to The Bachelor or Selling Sunset. in addition to celebrity guests, whether in the unscripted space or scripted as well.

Listen, this is breaking news, an emergency episode.

Kate is on the case.

Always.

Always, as we get into what's going on on....

It's funny, I'm so used to talking about the Real Housewives.

I'm like, the real, I'm like, actually, no, Carlos. It's Secret Lies of Mormon Wives. We have learned today, Kate, that Taylor, excuse me, Taylor Frankie Paul steps away from the show after allegedly failing court-ordered drug tests, citing disgusting bullying from the castmates. Before we get into how Kate feels, Um, I do want to read a little bit of the statement.

She gives her gratitude to all the networks that supported her throughout this and gave her a chance to return. However, she does not desire to move forward like this. She then Kate lash out at her Mormon wives, castmates saying they engage in a pylon. Um, she wrote that laughing about my.

Kids is disgusting.

Uh, in her post as well, sources told Variety last week that, as reported by TMZ, Taylor allegedly failed a recent drug test ordered by Utah court during her ongoing custody battles with her ex-boyfriend Dakota, with whom she shares one son, and her ex-husband Tate, with whom she shares a son and a daughter.

Mm-hmm.

Give me the tea because in this statement, she does not address the drug test allegations. But Kate, what's going on? This is like your wheelhouse. Give us the tea, honey.

Well, I think it's important to note again that last week there was this drug test. If you watch the, okay, so they were supposed to film, you know, 10 episodes for the last season. Season five was only five episodes long. A lot of people are like, why? Well, it's because of the fallout with The Bachelorette. And now it was announced that that would not air. And then they were having all of these issues within the cast members. Like, I don't want to be on the show with this person.

And so it was only five episodes. And then season six was supposed to come back. And of course, all the other women would have trepidation because she has been central to the show. This is the problem that I think many... shows run into is you can't make the show about one person. And the show was born out of this soft swinging scandal, but she really was at the center of it. And she's one of those characters that just sucks out all of the air in the room.

So because of that, when there was all of this news with regard to her being pulled or her season being pulled, Of course, it puts the show in flux because it's like, okay, well, she's the central character. So they were all really frustrated season five. Then there's the announcement of season six. It was assumed that she may not come back, especially because there was also an announcement that there's this offshoot show called Secret Lives of Sister Wives Orange County. And some of them were living for a short period of time in Orange County. So I thought this is going to be the new frontier. Like they're moving away from Taylor Frankie Balk. Well, then it was announced that she would be coming back. So Michaela,

one of the cast members, put out a statement saying, you know, I'm out basically. I can't take this. Paraphrasing, but growing up in a house that was less than ideal, I do not want to put myself in this situation any longer. And, you know, I'm leaving. So then there was a lot of discussion about like, well, what's going to happen in the show? Because obviously no one wants to film with this person who is incredibly erratic. Now, if you have not watched the last five episodes, I'll tell you this. Something is off. Something's really off. And I had speculated with Chelsea DeVantis, who you would love.

She is a comedy writer. She just wrote a movie. She is brilliant. And she lived in Utah and grew up in this culture. And she was explaining that the behavior of of Taylor Frankie Paul was especially alarming in the last few episodes. And she reminded me of this one episode in a restaurant where she had been in New York. She was filming stuff that was like post the bachelorette.

Nope.

You're going to love this one. She's engaged to the guy that she meets on the show. So that's one relationship. She's still sleeping with the guy, Dakota, the ex that she's in all of this legal trouble with. That's two. And then the duration of the filming, those five episodes, there's another guy that she DMed with. He's in the hotel room in New York. So there are three men she's speaking to at one time while filming this show.

Talk about chaotic. Well, the one scene, she comes down from that hotel room into the restaurant where the other cast members are, and she's clearly on something. Now, for me to notice somebody's on drugs is bad. Like, it's bad. And her behavior was so alarming that I just thought, what the hell is really going on behind the scenes of the show? So when it was announced a couple days ago that she failed this drug test, ding, ding, ding, ding, it's like, okay, this all kind of makes sense. So I think there are two things that are really disturbing about this. One, someone who's clearly really in the most chaotic point of their life and desperately needs help. But she's also a reality star. And the second part of

this is she's part of a system that is rewarding chaotic behavior. So as we know, because we cover this all the time and you certainly make shows and you've been privy to stuff off camera. We have somebody who has been successful in reality television because their life is completely toxic. They are toxic person. They surround themselves with toxicity, but they've been rewarded for it. She cheats on her husband.

She becomes a TikTok star. She becomes a TikTok star. She gets a television show. She's a disaster on the television show. She's named The Bachelorette. You know, working in this industry, it's like people who have large followings, it's like walk them through the city in a golden chalice. Like they get anything they want. They're rewarded. And who knows even if that following is real, right? But that's the name of the game in entertainment. If you have over...

And in her case, I think it's like 7 million followers. She just keeps getting handed opportunities. So there's never any consequences for her behavior. In fact, it's giving her more opportunities. There's more in financial incentive. There's more career incentive. At what point does the industry say this person needs to walk away and get help? And what point does a reality star make peace with the fact that fame is another level of addiction? And because she's addicted to the fame and because this opportunity is probably being pulled from her, what does she do? She starts blaming others because it's a psychological defense.

So the thing is this, she arguably, so I don't watch the show, right? I've dabbled in and out of episodes. Not that it's not a great show. It's just, you know, with everything I have going on.

I would say it's like pre-Housewives. It's like, Post-teen mom, but pre-housewives. It lives in that space. And it lives in a space in a part of the country that is not very exciting, landscape-wise.

Okay.

I'm aware that she's the face of the show.

Like, even if I'm aware of that.

And when all of the controversy that you and I talked about when she first, um, got the bachelorette taken away from her, we saw the video of her and I believe it was Dakota, um, having this sort of like fight and then the child was there and whether or not the child was hit by something she threw. Um, um, When she was not fired, that's when my spidey senses as producer said, she means.

Too much to the program.

They view her as a valuable asset to this show.

You and I both know, me as producer, you as an expert, you and I both know that on an ensemble show, one thing these women don't want is a bona fide obvious star that they feel the network may protect.

Mm-hmm.

Right? They don't like that.

So when she was allowed to come back, I knew that I wonder how this is going.

To play out.

A woman quit last week. She now failed the drug test.

Do you think.

they had no choice but to say, she's a huge liability.

We have to let her go. We won't have a shopping point.

I think those producers held on with white knuckles. I think the general counsel had to step in and say, this is such a huge liability at this point.

Yeah.

I mean, the show really began as this soft swinging scandal and you wanted to watch because you're like, everyone's so cute and they make these dance routines up. But behind the scenes, they're all sleeping with each other's husbands. And it's like, okay, that's why you watch the show, right? You're like, what? But then it became... more about like their lives as influencers. And I think we live in a time, I can say at the end of 2026, where people have a little bit of a fatigue, influencer fatigue.

Do we really want to see all the great things that you get just because like you're willing to show your insane life on social media? Like I think people are kind of like getting over it. So I think it's the, we're sort of hitting the wall in respect to that interest in that topic. And on top of like, it's not the show's no longer what was really interesting in the first place. And they're all kind of getting older.

And I mean, listen, older, normal people are going to go older. The show just like filmed the last two years in reality TV, people grow the, their life experiences are like four times as fast as what goes through our, you know, mundane lives. So the show is no longer about like these, you know, somewhat, um, say pure, but naive young moms. And now it's too much inside baseball.

And if it's inside baseball and on top of it, you know, okay, they don't want to film with somebody because this affects not only their, you know, their relationship with their community and their church, but also now with brands that they're working on. Like this is a little too dark and this is not what we want to watch something and feel like we're watching people through their through their front windows of their house. We're like sneaking a peek through somebody's house. This feels like we're watching a bunch of people who have more than they deserve surrounding and supporting somebody who is also a parent of very young children. She's the mother of an eight-year-old, a six-year-old, and a two-year-old. This is not entertaining. It's not entertaining.

You see somebody who's about to you know, drive straight into a brick wall. It's just not entertaining anymore. And so the other women are like, I don't want to participate and be collateral damage to this story. And I think that they've all, you know, of course they would sign up in the beginning because of the opportunity. But then after a while, it's like, I wish people knew this part of my life and I'm trying to gain my own power and to have my own identity outside of this. And it's really hard to do that when someone else, like I said, is sucking all of the air out of the room.

This is Reality with the King, and I'm Carlos King.

Let's get back into the show.

One thing she said, Kate, in her post today, she said, I treated production and crew with respect always. In fact, they are ones who checked on me throughout this. I agree it's to the point of bullying for months now. What makes it harder to take in is some of these parents have made mistakes that would result in the same judgment I'm receiving.

Delusion.

It's crazy. It's a psychological defense. She's just, you know, assigning blame to other people. But also the crew is showing up because they're employed to do so. She's mistaking. This is the whole of the thing of like when you've been on a show too long and you need to walk away and actually have a real life and heal yourself. The crew is there because they are employees of a corporation that you work under. They are not there because they think you're the greatest person that walked the earth. In fact, they're probably ruining the day they even got this job because you're such a nightmare.

When I read that, you and I have both talked about whether it's family, friends, whomever that we know or people we interview who dealt with addiction.

I'm not saying she has one. I'm not going to label that.

But the assigning of blame to other people.

I think she's a fame addiction. One hundred percent.

OK. OK. I was thinking more substance. Like I'm not saying she's a substance.

Well, she did not. She didn't pass a drug test. So, yeah, I don't know if that you can't really. I don't I don't. Listen, addiction when it comes to substance abuse is really hard unless someone says, like, I do have a problem. Passing the drug test certainly is very worrisome. But I do think she does exhibit signs of having an addiction to fame. And that is a problem because all of these bad choices that she's making, it's like she's doing everything to get engagement, right? And she's being rewarded for it. So it's like a feedback loop. She's addicted to the feedback loop.

Yeah, and that was a thing for me because if I know I was put on the spot where I lost the opportunity for the Bachelorette to air... although it was rumored that, well, now that the dust has settled, maybe it can come back.

But I do know.

In the first episode, I think the first episode that I watched, I do know they revealed like who the winner of the, not the winner, but like she was proposed to, they gave away like all the tea. So I was like, oh, well maybe the Bachelorette isn't going to come back, meaning her season. But I felt like, Taylor, you're not learning from your mistake.

Listen, you and I both know she got fired. It's obvious.

And the letter to me exhibited that. That's not like a woman who quit. That's not like a woman who was forced to fire. And most Housewives, where Bravo says, release.

Your own statement. We don't give a shit to release ours.

She did it.

And she put all the blame on.

No, the one part she does say, and I'm sure that there are parts that I'm responsible for. And I was like, oh, she felt like she had to throw that in.

I was going to say, it felt like a... Okay, words out of my mouth. It felt like a throw in.

It felt like, I'm 98% going to blame everyone else. Let me just grab 2% of ownership. But all of this happened because you failed a court-ordered drug test. And Kay, you tell me if I got this wrong. From my understanding... If a court ordered anything, you're aware that they have the legal right to randomly drug test you.

I believe so. And I think also, she's only allowed, I think, four hours per week with the kids. Like, I think four hours with the older two and four hours with the younger one. Because there are two different fathers. And I think that Michaela made mention of something about that. Like, she was angered. She had to walk away from the show because of her, you know, self-preservation. But I think that there was some sort of baiting going on. And her response, Michaela's response was like, listen, I'm dealing with somebody who like has only a few hours a week per, you know, with their children. And then again, Taylor goes, oh, well, I'm being bullied. You're making fun of my situation. It's, it's that flipping, you know, not taking responsibility. But listen,

I would be like, I don't want to be on a show with somebody. who does not share my value system. I don't.

I think based on the behavior that has been displayed, we were only allowed to see one footage that people are saying that Dakota allegedly leaked himself. But we, we, based on that alone, I think that was enough for me to be like, there's an issue here, you know? And yeah, to know that things were allegedly, Kate, happening before that. And now that we know after that you're failing a drug test, there's a problem there. And you keep saying fame addiction, which as a producer.

I would hope mine would take that.

Maybe even a sex addiction. There were three men that she was like juggling at one time.

I think.

I think everything she's doing is to mask whatever pain that she's dealing with that she refuses not to talk about. And look, everyone has said this, and I believe it's true being a producer. The biggest addiction is fame.

Mm-hmm.

Why is that, though, Kate?

Why is it that people, there's rehab for substance abuse?

Yeah.

Rehab for fame.

Why do you think people don't really take the addiction of fame seriously when you and I both know it does exist?

Because we live in a culture where you're rewarded for it. I mean, you could be a very hard worker in your skill set, but the person that has, you know, 1.2 million followers on social media is considered more valuable. That is currency in our current climate. So, of course people and then you know you suddenly strangers are validating you because of you know whatever you post online and remember people like a social media account is a very curated version of someone's life they are just putting out what they want you to see you are not going to see all of the things that go on throughout their day and their relationship with different people. So they're putting out a very small curated version. And then, you know,

people are like, Oh my God, you're, you're gorgeous. You're the smartest person. Oh my God. What kind of car do you drive? Oh my God. What kind of lipstick do you use? And then they're putting out videos. They're like, get ready with me. Like everybody's been asking me like what kind of eyeliner I've been using. And I did that.

Like this was not the way we grew up. You can imagine like suddenly you go from being like a normal person and then there's strangers that are like, oh my God, I have to know what kind of bag you have and what kind of car you drive and what kind of candle you like to use in your room. And people get real high on the fumes. That's the validation that they didn't get from their boyfriend, their girlfriend, their sister, their mother, their father, their teacher. Suddenly it fills that void. But it's a short-winded thing. we've seen housewives where they're like when they're on the show they're like i am literally a movie star like people stare at me and then there's a real come down when they are kicked off the show or whatever happens and

they're like wait actually nobody cares about they never did care about you it's just that you were high in the algorithm for a moment and again we all are looking through social media every single one of us through a curated tunnel right And so we're getting what we're looking for. And so people start to believe that they are so interesting to other people that they are top of mind throughout the rest of the world. Like I see this a lot with reality stars and whatever network, like sometimes even with Bravo in the past where it's like, I'm on the biggest show in the world. It's like, no, you think it is because your algorithm is telling you that.

But if you go out in the real world, one out of 12 people know what the hell you're talking about, about like this week's episode and you know, Amsterdam or whatever it is. Like they don't know, but they begin to believe it. And when they begin to believe it, it's like their brain chemistry changes and then they start to treat people differently. And it's like, and this is based on what, like some sort of skillset you just sort of like adopted. I mean, you were, you're on a show. Oh my God. There's someone, there's this one producer who once said to me, Do you have any idea how hard it is for me to explain to people you're on the show because you're you're on the show because you're a disaster. That's why you're on the show.

But I mean, they just get some it's the feedback loop is so addictive.

It is. It is.

It is.

So, Kate, question for you. As we sort of like follow this story as it continues. Where does The Secret Lies of Mormon Wives go from here without their star?

It's not going to be a popular opinion, but she needs to go off. She can't be on TV for at least another five years. Sorry. You have to get well. You can't be on TV for at least five years, but I think they should just get a whole new cast. I just think you got to start out fresh. I know that's a headache for networks and for producers, but It's just, we see this time and time again that you have somebody who completely fractures the show and then you get rid of one person, but you keep like four or maybe you can keep everybody and try to reinvent the wheel. Like I would just start fresh. It's not going to be hard to find people that have interesting lives. I know this is like crazy thing, crazy thinking,

but like, I feel like I meet interesting people a hundred times a day. Like you can find people who want to be on TV who have great lives. Like it's, it's, you can do it. And I think the women that have been in part of the show, you got, you squeezed everything out of the lemon, you know, maybe it's time to move on. And I think that that's the hardest life lesson for somebody who participates in a reality show.

Like maybe you had your moment and it was only for like a year or, you know, two seasons and then you move on. but they can't let go of it. They start to believe that like they are an actual television personality.

Yeah.

You know, like the real world, how many of them were like, Oh, I'm going to be a TV host now. Where are any of them now?

Yeah.

You have to just enjoy your moment in the sun. Kind of like a college football player. Can you imagine like a 32 year old dude coming back to the field? Hey guys, let's like, let's do it again. And everyone's like, you're not in shape anymore. OK, you've got like ACL issues like you got to call it a day.

Yeah. No, I agree. I agree. I agree.

And this is even lessons for producers like you can't bet the farm or one cast member.

Yeah.

Because if something happens to one cast member, it can destruct your show. So listen, Raindrops, we will continue following the story as it develops. Reality with the King is executive produced by me, Carlos King, produced by Jamie Schaefer in partnership.

With the Black Effect Podcast Network.

You can also find us at our YouTube channel at thecarlosking underscore. I'm also dropping tons of exclusive episodes on Patreon, which you don't want to miss.

Make sure to subscribe to that, too.

TAYLOR FRANKIE PAUL SHOCKER | SLOMW News with Kate Casey

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