‘Southern Charm’ EP Aaron Rothman Is Annoyed That Reality TV Remains “Deeply, Deeply Underappreciated”

On the hot and sunny summer morning of the Southern Charm reunion taping in New York City, executive producer of the show Aaron Rothman sat in the hair and makeup trailer where the guys were getting their grooming done, quietly typing away on his phone. But when I asked how he was feeling, as I asked many of the cast members that morning (and more of that to come!), he told me that it’s “definitely stressful leading up to it because you have this incredible mix of the show airing and life happening.” That perhaps had never been truer, considering the episode where Madison LeCroy accused Shep Rose of giving Danni Baird chlamydia had aired on national television just 12 hours prior.

“This cast is legit friends and I’ll never know anything that they don’t all know,” Rothman said. “It’s intense and it builds up to this moment. They’re wound tight, I’m wound tight and it becomes a pretty intense experience all around,” he said of the reunion ahead.

And after a year that found Southern Charm with a bit of a rebuilding season on its hands, Rothman was candid about the adjustments to the show. “The challenges of the season are when you lose a major participant of any show, it keeps me up at night as to like, you gotta make a show,” he said, referring to the absence of Thomas Ravenel. “We’re not living our lives with somebody anymore so it’s one less and that’s not great if it was anyone.”

Plus, after the actual craziness of Season 5, Rothman knew that Season 6 was sure to have a different vibe. “Aren’t series an ebb and flow of things?” he asked. “Could an audience live through something like that again and again and again and again? Or do you need some other stories and other explorations? I mean, Ashley is banana pants,” he said, pointing to her recent Cameo videos as further proof, just in case we needed any more.

Ultimately, Rothman admits that he is “always surprised” by the drama that arises on this show. “I literally am like, what? That happened? That’s not real. What?” It’s a justified disbelief considering this show has resulted in everything from screaming matches to drunken mishaps to pregnancies over the course of its run, a fact the only makes Rothman even more indignant. “I have my high horse about our genre in general and I think it’s deeply, deeply underappreciated in the craft of television,” he said, specifically pointing to elements such as the brilliant editing and scoring. “These shows are incredible and the relationship the audience has with the participants of these shows is mind-blowing. It’s incredible for them, it’s incredible for me, it’s incredible for you. It’s this unbelievable experience and I don’t know if we’re appreciated for it. There’s no way that anyone could have written any of this, period. They just would’ve thought you’re insane. That’s just underappreciated and I feel that way all the time.”

Southern Charm airs Wednesday at 9pm ET/PT on Bravo. 

Where to stream Southern Charm