Melissa Gorga on If Daughter Antonia Was Asked to Join Next Gen NYC, RHONJ Pause, New Cast, and Potential Spinoff, Plus Shades Kathy Wakile for “[Reaching]” for Story

Melissa Gorga is revealing whether her 19-year-old daughter, Antonia Gorga, was asked to join Bravo’s new spinoff, Next Gen NYC, which features the children of other Real Housewives.

While she also shaded Kathy Wakile, 59, over comments about their lunch date, discussed the ongoing pause and potential new cast of The Real Housewives of New Jersey, and shared her thoughts on starring in her own spinoff series, Melissa, 45, confirmed if Antonia had been approached for a role. 

“No, not yet. She’s still in college,” Melissa revealed during an April 23 interview with Us Weekly.

As for whether she’d encourage Antonia to appear on the show in the future, Melissa suspected her daughter wouldn’t be open to it.

“I’ll never tell my daughter not to do something, but I don’t think that’s the path she would choose at this point,” she explained. “I don’t know, though. You never know, so I’ll let her do whatever makes her happy.”

Currently, Melissa said Antonia is “in her element” at the University of Delaware.

“She’s enjoying it. She loves it,” she stated.

Moving on to RHONJ, Melissa admitted it “feels like forever” since she filmed and said it’s been a “nice” break.

“It’s nice not to have to deal with like, defending yourself for no reason and people trying to say things that aren’t true and dealing with that family drama,” she reasoned. “I’m so past … dealing with that negative energy. I feel free in a certain way from that, and it feels great.”

While Melissa feels like the show is “going to come back around,” she confirmed she’ll be okay if it doesn’t.

“I would just be like, ‘Okay, let’s see what’s next.’ I can’t be on the same show forever. It’s been 15 years,” she noted. “[But] I’m grateful for those years. And, obviously, it’s given me the platform that I have.”

Then, when asked if there would have to be a new cast to convince her to return, Melissa replied, “I think yes.”

“[And] it seems like that’s why they’re waiting so long. They’re not holding us this long to do the same thing,” she suspected.

Melissa also addressed the possibility of moving on to her own show.

“I don’t know. It would have to be the right situation. There’s definitely things that we’ve been talking about, but it would be a little different spin. Let’s just put it that way,” she explained.

Meanwhile, after hearing what her cousin-in-law, Kathy, had to say about her supposed mistruths about their lunch date, Melissa refuted the suggestion that she tried to control the narrative by not sharing the details right away.

“Well this is a strange reach- I did reach out trying to connect [Kathy and Joe Gorga] with nothing but good intentions- she asked me to please not tell anyone we had lunch and not to mention it in the press or on my podcast. So I honored her wishes,” Melissa revealed in a comment shared to Kathy’s interview with Page Six.

“I guess she wanted to be the one to tell the story. Okkkk,” she added.

The Real Housewives of New Jersey has been on pause since August 2024.