If there is one thing Jessel Taank is going to do, it’s have a controversial opinion about Manhattan neighborhoods.
The star of the Real Housewives of New York is behind what has emerged as the most iconic moment from the reboot’s first season: when she met castmate Erin Lichey for a coffee in Tribeca, and called the famously wealthy and chic area “really up-and-coming.” The scene and her comment were the source of countless memes; even Netflix quoted it to advertise the new season of Selling Sunset.
Given the moment’s ubiquity, one can imagine how often Taank was asked about the scene while at BravoCon in Las Vegas over the weekend. Waiting to talk to her in the press room, where she and co-star Brynn Whitfield were the final Bravolebs to walk the red carpet, I overheard the words “up-and-coming” come from just about every news outlet she spoke to. Still, nothing could have prepared me for the answer she gave a reporter next to me about what she thinks the next “up-and-coming” neighborhood is going to be. Friends, she said Hudson Yards.
To be fair, Taank doubled over laughing when she heard my flabbergasted reaction. A gasp and incredulity: Hudson Yards??? “Honestly, it’s a recent thing, because we went there two weekends ago,” she told me, giggling and turning slightly red while mustering her defense. “And there was that shopping mall! I was walking around and was like, this is kind of cool. And there’s an amazing apartment building with this full-service pool situation. I was like, I actually don’t hate it here.”
Maybe she’s onto something, I suggest. Unlike Tribeca, which, as Lichey told Taank on the show, had definitely already arrived, Hudson Yards, with its towering, monolithic buildings devoid of any charm—and, in the western shadow of Penn Station, an absolute pain in the ass to get to—is often the butt of New Yorkers’ jokes. Its reputation can only go up from here.
“If I have to put money on it, I would say that maybe in five years time, we’ll be having a different conversation,” she said, still grinning.
Fascinating opinions about Manhattan zip codes aside, it’s gratifying to see Taank feeling so light and good-natured at BravoCon. The massive fan event doubled as a celebratory party for the cast of RHONY, whose highly scrutinized and ultimately very successful first reboot season had just finished airing. Viewers had, by the end of the season, rallied around Taank specifically, a dramatic shift in public opinion from when the show launched and first impressions of the fashion publicist and mom to twin toddlers were not kind.
But somewhere around that now-legendary Tribeca moment, the tide shifted. Taank’s unique sense of humor and desire to, in her own way, emotionally connect with her castmates began to show. Moreover, the way that some of her co-stars judged and, some would say, bullied her—especially over her marriage to husband Pavit—earned her great empathy from fans who found it really unfair.
Besides, as far as what viewers saw, she and Pavit seemed to have an enviable dynamic, where they appeared to genuinely enjoy each other’s company and respect each other’s space. The fact that they hadn’t had sex in over a year, as Taank dealt with post-partum issues and they adjusted to life as parents of twins, preoccupied the cast in ugly ways. But over the course of the season as Taank spoke about it in confessionals, the dry spell seemed entirely understandable.
Pavit, too, has become a fan favorite in his own right. My gay friends and RHONY obsessives, in particular, have fallen in love with him, the news of which seemed to really tickle Taank. “I didn’t know that!” she said. “I love that for him. Listen, I told him from the get-go: You’re funny. You’re good-looking. You’re a tall drink of water. You dress well, because you’re married to me. I really do think that, if we do a Season 2, he is going to become a cast member, if that’s even a thing.”
He kind of already is, we told her. She visibly swooned a bit: “He’s just so great.”
It must have been a really validating experience to, after the difficulty of filming the season and being attacked several times by the other women, see while the episodes were airing that most viewers were on her side. “My husband’s a big fan of Twitter,” she said. “So he will go look in real time and be like, ‘Oh my God, [they think] what you said is amazing.’ So I felt very justified in thinking that my reaction to certain situations were legitimate.”
Arriving at that place wasn’t an easy journey.
“For me, Episodes 1 to 3 were really tough, because I felt like people were getting to know us, and they were making snap judgments, right?” she said. “It was very black and white. ‘I love her; I hate her.’ And I was hated. I wasn’t very popular. It was tough! I’ve never not been liked in my entire life. So it was really tough for me. Then people started to understand that I’m funny, I do have a little bit of a sarcastic British humor, I’m dry, and have a nice relationship that is actually quite hilarious. It was really, like, almost freeing.”
Beyond Taank emerging as the season’s breakout star, another noticeable element of the new RHONY was how emotional it was. Each episode, cast members shared traumatic stories about their pasts, discussing difficult relationships they had with their parents, what it was like to lose family members at a young age, and being candid about deep-seated insecurities and long-held emotional bruises. I have never cried so much while watching a season of Real Housewives. Did it feel that intense during filming?
“Filming that scene with my mom, I was really emotional,” Taank said, referencing a lunch she had with her mother where she told her for the first time about her years-long fertility struggles. “I’m getting emotional now thinking about it. I was so scared to talk about that with her, and then to do it on national television?! But I did think it was such an important moment, because I hopefully empowered a lot of women to do the same. So I know in hindsight it wasn’t easy going through it, and it certainly wasn't easy watching it. But I know it was a good thing that we did.”
At this point in her experience with the show, especially being at BravoCon, Taank said she’s been enjoying her, as she exclaimed, “Redemption!” Laughing, she added, “I should walk down the red carpet like it’s my catwalk.” At this point, Whitfield showed up by her side on the red carpet. Taank pulled her into a hug and said, “We should do a victory lap!,” and mimed running around the media room. It’s a come-from-behind win, and the Taank Tops—what her most enthusiastic fans have dubbed themselves—are thriving.