Zarin was fired from the show on Feb. 10 over racist comments she made about Bad Bunny’s 2026 Super Bowl halftime show performance
Dorinda Medley is ready to once again “make it nice” on reality TV.
On Tuesday, Feb. 17, E! announced Medley, 61, as the newest cast member of their Real Housewives of New York City reboot series, The Golden Life. The news of Medley’s casting came one week after her fellow RHONY alum Jill Zarin was fired from the show over racist comments she made about Bad Bunny’s 2026 Super Bowl halftime show performance.
In the new docuseries, Medley will join previously announced cast members Kelly Bensimon, Luann de Lesseps, Sonja Morgan and Ramona Singer. The show is set to follow the women’s lives away from N.Y.C. in sunny Palm Beach, Fla.
“Well, the rumors are true! I will be joining the women on The Golden Life in Palm Beach,” Medley said in a statement. “After decades of friendship, and navigating life’s ups and downs together, it will be nice to reconnect with my ‘sisters.’ I am so excited to celebrate and share the next chapter of our lives!”
Produced by Blink49 Studios, the 10-episode season is due to start filming this spring. Blink49 Studios previously released a statement to PEOPLE on Feb. 10 — two days after Zarin’s Bad Bunny comments — confirming that Zarin, 62, would no longer be a part of the show.
“In light of recent public comments made by Jill Zarin, Blink49 Studios has decided not to move forward with her involvement in The Golden Life,” the studio said in their statement. “We remain committed to delivering the series in line with our company standards and values.”
In a since-deleted video posted to her Instagram on Super Bowl Sunday, Zarin called Bad Bunny’s performance “the worst halftime show ever.”
“It’s 250 years that we’re celebrating right now in the United States, and I just don’t think it was appropriate to have it in Spanish,” she said.
Zarin continued, “I don’t speak Spanish, I would have liked to have known the words he was saying. To me, it looked like a political statement because there were literally no white people in the entire thing.”
She then added, “I’m not taking a side one way or the other, I just do…think it was an ICE thing. I just think that the NFL sold out, and it’s very sad because this was 75 years and you know, shame. Shame.”
In a statement to In Touch, Zarin said that she took down her video “right away.”
“People make mistakes,” she said. “I’m human.”
The Golden Life comes four years after Bravo rebooted RHONY in 2022 for its 14th season, which featured a whole new cast of Housewives.
