Are the guests even AT Château Rosabelle?!
The Big Picture
- Lisa Vanderpump has started a new reality TV show centering around her French Villa, Château Rosabelle, called
Vanderpump Villa
. -
Vanderpump Villa
details the drama between the staff of the Chateau, but doesn’t focus enough on the guest interaction. - Bravo’s
Below Deck
has struck the perfect balance between staff drama and guest experience, and
Vanderpump Villa
would benefit from this distinction.
Lisa Vanderpump is one of the most beloved figures to come from Bravo. As a main cast member of The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills, Lisa Vanderpump got used to displaying her life on screen, which expanded to her fan-favorite spin-off series, Vanderpump Rules, which follows the staff at her SUR Restaurant and Lounge in Los Angeles. But Lisa Vanderpump had no plans on slowing down and showing off her other ventures and concepts. Vanderpump Villa, a Hulu Original Series, takes VPR’s concept of watching Lisa and the “hardworking” staff and applies it to her French Villa, Château Rosabelle. Set in the south of France, Vanderpump Villa is almost an amalgamation of two hit Bravo franchises, Vanderpump Rules and Below Deck.
Sadly, Vanderpump Villa has captured the essence of the former but does not lean deep enough into the latter. Vanderpump Villa is a lens into the hospitality industry, but it seems to forget the biggest element of hospitality: the guests! With so much time focused on the drama between the overstuffed staff, when the guests are shown, something feels completely amiss. On Below Deck, the mission is to give the guests the vacation of a lifetime. On Vanderpump Villa, the guests feel like extras on a film set asked to pretend like they’re actually there for their dream event. Vanderpump Villa must balance the staff’s lives with the practical guest experience.
Vanderpump Villa has tried so hard to capitalize on its namesake’s popularity and success. Whether it’s lacking the edge of being on a different network or if it’s because, shocker, Château Rosabelle is only a pop-up place, the formula is not working. Every great reality television show has its growing pains in its first season, but for Vanderpump Villa to thrive, showcasing the guest experience is crucial. There are certainly enough reality television programs to watch if your goal is to watch a bunch of young adults fight while living with one another. Lisa Vanderpump continues to tell the audience that the guest experience is paramount. It’s time to show rather than tell!
Vanderpump Villa
Follows the hand-picked crew of Lisa Vanderpump’s opulent French villa as they live and cooperate to satisfy each extravagant want of their affluent visitors.
- Release Date
- April 1, 2024
- Cast
- Lisa Vanderpump , Hannah Fouch , Priscila Ferrari , Emily Kovacs , Eric Funderwhite , Anthony Bar , Caroline Byl , Grace Cottrell
- Seasons
- 1
- Creator(s)
- Lisa Vanderpump
- Franchise(s)
- Vanderpump
Where Is ‘Vanderpump Villa’ Filmed?
Vanderpump Villa takes the audience on a stunning escape to an estate in the commune of Mazerolles-du-Razes. The real countryside property is known as Château St. Jospeh, and serves as the backdrop for Château Rosabelle. The existing property is home to Lisa Vanderpump’s pop-up luxury hotel. When not borrowed for reality television, the existing venue hosts weddings and events with a hotel-style stay during the summer. Set to display what it’s like to experience high-class travel and vacation, Vanderpump Villa puts more focus on the people who are working to create the experience rather than the people present for it. Once the guest of honor and their guests arrive at the property, viewers see them essentially in two locations, the bar and the property grounds. From there, who really knows what they are doing during their 72-hour excursion?
The Guests Aren’t the Focus of ‘Vanderpump Villa’
Lisa shares at the start of the series that her mission is to ensure that her guests get the complete Vanderpump curated experience. If the goal is to give the guests the Vanderpump-curated experience, they’re getting their money’s worth by watching reality stars fight like the cameras are rolling, which they literally are. In the world of hospitality, there are rules; there are dos and don’ts for the staff. Things that are surefire ways to have you removed from your job. And yet, Lisa actively turns a blind eye, likely because if the staff was actually doing their job, it wouldn’t be as engaging as a television program.
Vanderpump Villa has managed to capture the essence of drama fans love from Vanderpump Rules, but the experience of staying at the Château Rosabelle is severely negated. The show needs to take a page from Below Deck and its four spin-offs to figure out how to capture the balance of focusing on the staff and focusing on the guests through the lens of the staff. On Below Deck, fraternizing with the guests is forbidden — it’s gotten yachties fired! On Vanderpump Villa, the staff is literally drinking, playing, and flirting with the guests. The guests are almost like props for the staff to build their stories off of. In Episode 1, LVP told her staff that there was no drinking on duty, and that the main bar was for the guests. Every episode onward, every staff member is taking a swig straight from the bottle, or stealing shots from the table. Lisa no longer admonishes her staff because now, if it makes the guests feel like they’re having a great time, then it’s fine with her!
Vanderpump Rules watches the front and back of house antics of popular Vanderpump restaurants. Vanderpump Villa has those elements of the service industry but rarely do viewers see them actually do those jobs. They show the tail end of these activities. Unlike Vanderpump Rules, Vanderpump Villa adds the element of a guest stay. And yet rarely do we see the housekeepers do any turn down or cleaning. The General Manager of the Château never gives a tour of the residence.
Lisa presents these captivating and beautiful stories that each of her guests of honor are present to celebrate. She does sit down with many of them for a heart-to-heart. She’ll coach a guest on how to propose or help advocate for the beauty of a gender transition, but that’s where it seems to stop. Her guests don’t get the five-star experience of being on a program like they do on a show like Below Deck. The yacht staff are the stars there, but how they engage and serve their guests is the central point of the story. Vanderpump Villa needs to understand that is how this show is meant to maneuver.
How ‘Vanderpump Villa’ Fits Into the Vanderpump Universe
Vanderpump Villa is LVP’s latest show. This time set in the South of France. As they embark on living and working together drama is set to ensue.
Château Rosabelle Doesn’t Feel Like a Real Business
Vanderpump Villa lacks the high-stakes hospitality aspect that displays the reality of the industry. The biggest drawback to Vanderpump Villa is it wants to showcase a real booming business, but it’s not fully realized or fledged out to proceed as such. On Below Deck, each charter ends with a tip meeting to see how the paying customers felt about their stay. For Vanderpump Villa, the only tip that gets mentioned is feedback from the guests on a comment card. And thus far, what viewers are watching is a far cry from what the guests are experiencing.
Watching General Manager Eric Funderwhite being praised by the guests for his life-of-the-party approach is painful when you watch him defy any regulation that Lisa set forth, while his co-workers look down on his performance. But if the comment card said he was the star of the stay, then Lisa had to brush the fireable offense under the rug. That would never happen on any of the Below Deck yachts. As Captain Lee famously would say, “here’s a plane ticket home.” With inconsistent rules, the show seems quite flimsy. Even the job descriptions for the staff are haphazardous. One moment, events coordinator Gabriella Sanon is setting up a dinner and the next, she’s seen canoodling with the hot guy who’s a friend of the guest of honor. In no other industry would that be feasible! When the guests are seen, it’s to forward a staff plot point, and that’s not truly what this show should be focusing on.
‘Vanderpump Villa’ Needs To Be More Like ‘Below Deck’
Like Below Deck, the staff at Château Rosabelle live and work together. They are confined to the staff quarters where they are living their Downton Abbey dreams. The job titles include server, chef, mixologist, housekeeper, and events coordinator. On Below Deck, the staff on the mega yachts are able to handle a party of six to nine people per charter. At Château Rosabelle, there’s an excess of employees, many of whom are rarely caught working. Being a reality television program, the plot needs to include each person’s story, somehow, someway. So, in order to do this, the guests get cut from the narrative. Château Rosabelle has two mixologists, Andre Mitchell and Telly Hall, both of whom are competent at their job. And yet, with two people behind the bar, the show has managed to catch neither present at times, causing complaints about the drink service.
Anthony Bar is the resident executive chef, with Caroline Byl introduced as his sous chef. Both have a passion for their culinary art, but viewers see the bare bones of their techniques in the kitchen. There’s even a moment where Caroline is introduced to the guests as the chef. Vanderpump Villa is staffed with a pair of events coordinators, Stephen Alsvig and Gabriella Sanon. What is their job exactly? Great question! Setting up tables and chairs perhaps? Nevertheless, Stephen’s story line has been about his jealousy of not being hired as General Manager while Gabriella has suddenly become boy crazy. While the job description lacks definition, to muddy the waters even further, Lisa continually discusses her vision for the events of each guest’s stay. Does that mean Stephen and Gabriella are just there to ensure Lisa’s curation goes without a hitch? Shouldn’t we see how it all gets done? The process of curating the experience seems much more enjoyable than watching exes Marciano Brunette and Hannah Fouch fight, then hook up, then get jealous of the actions the other is doing. The moral of the story here is: Is anyone doing their job?
At the end of the day, Vanderpump Villa desperately wants to be Below Deck on land, but sadly, Vanderpump Villa is lost way out at sea. Lisa Vanderpump is captain of this ship, and as it stands now, it’s sinking. In any program about the behind-the-scenes antics of the hospitality business, guests are a central figure to the action. For Vanderpump Villa, the guests become second fiddle. There is a severe lack of authenticity that calls into question the purpose of the guests. The guests need action, just not in the way the show is using them.
Vanderpump Villa airs new episodes on Mondays on Hulu in the U.S.
This article was originally published on collider.com