Reality television has been with us for decades, and as long as there's been reality television, there have been people trying to springboard from those shows to success in other mediums—careers in acting, pop music, and even the business world. Of course, some reality personalities are more poised for breakout success than others. These 30 reality TV stars have proved themselves the most adept at jumping off from their reality beginnings and achieving careers that stand strong on their own. And for another walk down memory lane, revisit these 19 Reality TV Shows You Forgot Existed.
1 | Bethenny Frankel (The Real Housewives of New York City)
ShutterstockWhile the other women on The Real Housewives of New York City spent their time navigating their spouses, children, expensive apartments, and homes in the Hamptons, Bethenny Frankel spent her first couple years on the show working for herself. The only single woman in the show's early seasons, Frankel was often looked at as a sad figure without a husband or kids. Little did they know, she was busy amassing a brand empire, under the banner of her Skinnygirl cocktails. Her lifestyle brand was so strong that she was eventually able to sell it for $100 million. Frankel is the success story of the Housewives franchise, the proof that introducing yourself to America in such a warts-and-all way can help build a lifestyle empire that can make even Jill Zarin green with envy. And for more contentious television series, these are The 15 Most Hated Popular TV Shows.
2 | Kelly Clarkson (American Idol)
ShutterstockAs the winner of the first season of American Idol, Kelly Clarkson has a place in modern pop history that no one can touch, and her breakout string of pop hits in the mid-2000s—"Miss Independent," "Since U Been Gone," "My Life Would Suck Without You"—are the kind of success story that most reality TV stars only dream of. And now, after millions of albums sold and Grammy Awards won, Clarkson is currently riding high on television, as a coach/mentor on The Voice and as the host of her own daytime talk show, which features her covering a different artist's hit song every day. There's genuinely no telling how high this new venture of Clarkson's will climb.
3 | Harry Styles (The X-Factor)
Shutterstock / Lev RadinThe story of how the five members of One Direction all auditioned for Simon Cowell and the judges on The X-Factor—Britain's evolutionary next step after American Idol—is basically legend at this point. Harry Styles, Zayn Malik, Louis Tomlinson, Liam Payne, and Niall Horan were placed together to perform as one act, and One Direction was born. But with One Direction now broken up into its various solo careers, it's Harry who's flying highest, with his song "Sign of the Times" anointed by Rolling Stone as Song of the Year, and acting roles on Saturday Night Live and in Christopher Nolan's Best Picture nominee Dunkirk. And for more talent that started young, check out these 25 Child Actors When They Got Their Start Vs. Now.
4 | Cardi B (Love & Hip Hop: New York)
ShutterstockAfter garnering attention as a Vine and Instagram personality, Cardi B was cast on Love & Hip Hop for its sixth and seventh seasons. Cardi was a highly quotable and often volatile cast member, and also arguably its breakout star. After two seasons on the show, she left to launch her rap career. Within six months of her Dec. 2016 departure from the show, Cardi released "Bodak Yellow," her breakout, star-making single, which would go on to be Grammy nominated and make Cardi one of the hottest names in rap. Most recently, Cardi appeared in the 2019 film Hustlers opposite Jennifer Lopez.
5 | The Miz (The Real World)
ShutterstockThe ambitions of the 20-somethings who have populated the Real World houses over the years have been eclectic and often peculiar. When Mike Mizanin was cast on The Real World's 10th season (Back to New York), he was the sheltered kid from Ohio who didn't know when Black History Month was and had a lot to learn. But as the season neared its end, an ambition poked out: Mike was so into WWE wrestling and The Rock that he adopted a wrestling persona of his own, The Miz. Through several seasons of The Challenge, Mike and The Miz became more and more inextricable. Or two sides of the same coin. But still, it was just one reality show kid having dumb fun, right? Cut to 2006, when The Miz debuted as a bona fide WWE wrestler, having gone through years of training and proving himself. In his 14-year WWE career, The Miz has been a champion many times over, including winning the WWE Championship in 2010.
6 | Emma Stone (In Search of The Partridge Family)
ShutterstockNot all stars to emerge from reality shows emerge from successful reality shows. Such is the case with Emma Stone, who was going by Emily Stone back in 2004, when she competed for a role on a revival of the classic musical family series The Partridge Family on VH1's In Search of The Partridge Family. Stone won, nabbing the coveted role of Laurie Partridge, but the ensuing TV show everybody was competing to appear on never made it past the pilot stage. Stone would have to achieve stardom the old-fashioned way, by giving dynamite performances in films like The House Bunny, Superbad, and Easy A, before a role in 2011's The Help helped make her an A-list star. She's, of course, gone on to win the Best Actress Oscar for her singing/dancing/emoting performance in La La Land, and most recently, she was scheming for the affections of Queen Anne in The Favourite. And for more stars before they were famous, check out these 25 Stars You Didn't Know Got Their Start in Commercials.
7 | Jennifer Hudson (American Idol)
ShutterstockIt's tough to overstate the pandemonium that ensued when Jennifer Hudson was eliminated in seventh place in American Idol's third season. Fans erupted, the judges were at a loss for an explanation, Elton John called the American public's decision "racist." It was a scene. But what they say about success being the best revenge is true, and less than three years later, Hudson stood on the Oscar stage as the winner of the Best Supporting Actress trophy for her elite-level belting as Effie White in Dreamgirls. Hudson has since kept up a robust TV and film career, in films like Spike Lee'sChi-Raq and TV shows like Smash and Empire. Most recently, Hudson's vocals were enough to earn a disreputable old glamour cat a trip to the Heaviside Layer in the motion picture extravaganza/disaster Cats.
8 | Carrie Underwood (American Idol)
Debby Wong/ShutterstockAfter Carrie Underwoodperformed Heart's "Alone" during Billboard Number Ones week, judge Simon Cowell declared that not only would Carrie win the season, but that she'd outsell all other American Idol winners. While the comment may have been taken as a shot at Clarkson, the fact of the matter is that Cowell was entirely right. Carrie won, she's sold 70 million records worldwide, and she's the 5th-highest-certified female artist on the RIAA's Top Artists ranking. She's also won seven Grammys, 14 Academy of Country Music Awards, starred in The Sound of Music Live! on NBC, started a fashion line, and earned a Guinness World Record for most No. 1's for a female country artist.
9 | Christian Siriano (Project Runway)
ShutterstockThe enfant terrible of Project Runway's fourth season, Christian Siriano entered the show as a conceptual genius with art-school hair and a massive ego. But when you have a massive ego, the only thing left to do is live up to it, and Siriano improbably did. Ever since his triumph as Season 4's winner, Siriano has gone on to make a real name for himself in the fashion world. His fashion label is a multi-million dollar venture, he's dressed countless celebrities for red carpet events, and in a full-circle moment that was perhaps cosmically inevitable, Siriano joined the cast of Project Runway as the contestants' mentor when the show returned to Bravo in 2019. And for more fun content delivered straight to your inbox, sign up for our daily newsletter.
10 | Kandi Burruss (The Real Housewives of Atlanta)
ShutterestockKandi Burruss was already a success when she joined the Atlanta iteration of the Housewives franchise, as a Grammy-winning songwriter and former member of the R&B group Xscape. But after 11 seasons on the show, Kandi is truly counting her blessings and her checks, with businesses as diverse as her Bedroom Kandi line of adult toys, her web series Kandi Koated Nights, and her Old Lady Gang Southern comfort food restaurants in Atlanta. As a result, Kandi's been able to earn a reputation as perhaps the most business savvy of all the Housewives.
11 | Ali Stroker (The Glee Project)
ShutterstockFinishing second on Season 2 of The Glee Project to Blake Jenner shouldn't have been a huge disappointment, especially after Jenner went on to star in such films as Everybody Wants Some!! and The Edge of Seventeen. But Ali Stroker would go on to surpass such accomplishments. With her role in Deaf West's production of Spring Awakening in 2015, Stroker made Broadway history as the first performer who uses a wheelchair to appear on a Broadway stage. In 2018, she was cast in the role of Ado Annie in the Daniel Fish revival of Oklahoma! After the show transferred to Broadway, Stoker's acclaimed performance won her a Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Musical—another first for a wheelchair user.
12 | Jamie Chung (The Real World)
ShutterstockDuring her time on The Real World: San Diego, Jamie Chung found herself often overshadowed by her louder, more boisterous, and more problematic housemates. But after she finished with that season (and one season of The Challenge), Jamie went on to start building her acting career. Early on, that meant roles in Dragonball Evolution, Sorority Row, the 2011 Zack Snyder-directed Sucker Punch, and Premium Rush opposite Joseph Gordon-Levitt. In 2012, she got the most high-profile role of her career so far, playing Mulan on ABC's Once Upon a Time. She's married to How to Make It in America and One Tree Hill star Bryan Greenberg.
13 | Nyle DiMarco (America's Next Top Model)
ShutterstockThere's a good chance that you didn't even realize that America's Next Top Model ever opened up its competition to men, but it did, and in 2015, that show's prestigious title went to dreamboat Nyle DiMarco. As DiMarco is deaf, his victory meant more than just another milestone for men who are chiseled of jaw. DiMarco was the first deaf winner (and contestant) of the show, and a year later, he went on to ABC's Dancing with the Stars, where he as his partner Peta Murgatroyd took it all the way to first place. Since his twin reality triumphs, DiMarco has become one of the country's preeminent deaf activists, working on advertising campaigns and with politicians like Hillary Clinton.
14 | Elisabeth Hasselbeck (Survivor)
ShutterstockOn Survivor: The Australian Outback, the show's second season, Elisabeth Hasselbeck (then Filarski) was the picture of sweetness and pluck, surviving the elements and finishing in fourth place. Her popularity carried over when it came time for The View to find a co-host to replace Lisa Ling. Now married to NFL quarterback (and eventual ESPN panelist) Tim Hasselbeck, Elisabeth boasted conservative cred that never made it to the surface on Survivor. For over a decade, Hasselbeck anchored the conservative corner on The View, ultimately squaring off with all of her co-hosts at one time or another, most famously a split-screen shouting match with Rosie O'Donnell. Hasselbeck left The View in 2013 to join Fox News' Fox & Friends, where she spent two years before essentially retiring, without so much as a cameo in Bombshell.
15 | Jacinda Barrett (The Real World)
ShutterstockIn The Real World's fourth season, set in London, the housemates were all pretty career-focused: Sharon the aspiring singer, Lars the DJ, Kat the fencer, Mike the race car driver, Jay the playwright. Jacinda was the model/actress, which could have made her come across like a dime a dozen—another pretty face trying to make it in Hollywood. But the Australian actress beat the odds, putting together a career that saw her acting opposite the likes of Joaquin Phoenix and John Travolta (Ladder 49), Kurt Russell (Poseidon), Renée Zellweger (Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason), and Kyle Chandler (Netflix's Bloodline).
16 | Stephanie Izard (Top Chef)
ShutterstockWinning Season 4 to become the first female Top Chef champion sounds impressive in and of itself. That Stephanie Izard did so by besting such a strong field, including Antonia Lofaso, Dale Talde, and Richard Blais is an even bigger accomplishment. Izard made the most of her Top Chef springboard by opening three restaurants in her native Chicago: Girl & the Goat, Little Goat, and Duck Duck Goat. (Why all the goats? "Izard" is the name of a mountain goat in the Pyrenees mountains.) And to top it all off, Izard won a prestigious James Beard Award in 2013 for Best Chef: Great Lakes.
17 | Ted Allen (Queer Eye for the Straight Guy)
ShutterstockThe resident food guru of the original Queer Eye Fab Five, Ted Allen managed to parlay that reputation long after the series went away. As the host of Chopped on Food Network, Allen gets to reveal the baskets full of absurd ingredients that the chefs need to use to prepare their meal. He also gets to remove the dome and reveal whose dish has been "chopped" (it's always the one who didn't incorporate the candy ingredient enough).
18 | Laura Osnes (Grease: You're the One That I Want!)
ShutterstockLike many reality shows in the U.S., the idea for Grease: You're the One That I Want! came from England, which had multiple reality series to cast lead roles in various Andrew Lloyd Webber projects. Since American network television hadn't quite landed on live TV musicals as a fad yet, this show was produced in the hopes of gathering Grease fans around their TV sets to see who would get cast as Danny and Sandy. In the latter role, the answer was Laura Osnes, who truly took her opportunity and ran with it. After Grease, Osnes got cast in South Pacific, Anything Goes, Bonnie & Clyde, Cinderella, and, most recently, Bandstand. She's already a two-time Tony Award nominee, and she's not even 35 yet.
19 | Alex Newell (The Glee Project)
ShutterstockThe idea for The Glee Project was to offer a pipeline into Glee/TV stardom for talented performers who might not get noticed by the usual Hollywood machine. That proved to be incredibly true for Alex Newell, who may not have won the show, but who got perhaps the best platform from it in the role of Unique Adams. After Glee, Newell garnered rave reviews for his scorching Broadway debut in the revival of Once on This Island. He currently co-stars with Jane Levy and Lauren Graham on NBC's magical-realist musical fantasy Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist.
20 | Katie Stevens (American Idol)
ShutterstockBy the time Katie Stevens appeared on American Idol in its 9th season, we were already seeing signs that the show wasn't as big of a star-maker as it used to be. So rather than launch an 8th-place finisher like Stevens directly to stardom, she had to take a more roundabout path. Four years after her Idol experience ended, Stevens got the lead role on MTV's queer coming-out dramedy Faking It, where Stevens played a teen girl whose best friend realized she was in love with her. That show lasted for three seasons, after which she was cast as Jane, a burgeoning journalistic talent on Freeform's The Bold Type.
21 | Ariana DeBose (So You Think You Can Dance)
ShutterstockYou'd be forgiven for not realizing Ariana DeBose had ever been on So You Think You Can Dance, and that's because she was cruelly eliminated in the first week of Season 6. But since that unfortunate departure, DeBose has made herself a rather exceptional career as a Broadway star. She went from Bring It On: The Musical to Hamilton, where she notably played the Bullet. Last year she got a Tony nomination for her role in Summer: The Donna Summer Musical. We may still be merely on the ground floor for the Ariana DeBose Experience, however, since her next role will be as Anita—you know, the role Rita Moreno won an Oscar for—in Steven Spielberg's remake of West Side Story.
22 | Stephen "Twitch" Boss (So You Think You Can Dance)
ShutterstockAfter just missing the cut for Season 3, hip-hop dancer Twitch made the cast in Season 4 and was sensational, making it all the way to the runner-up position. The show was so infatuated with him as a dancer and personality that they kept inviting him back as a judge, choreographer, and ultimately team leader in the show's Stage vs. Street season. Twitch's success on Dance helped propel him into further success in other ventures, such as movies—where he's appeared as part of the central dance crew in the Step Up films—and on TV, where he's in-house DJ on The Ellen DeGeneres Show and announcer/sidekick on Ellen's Game of Games.
23 | David Giuntoli (Road Rules)
ShutterstockThe acting ambitions of the various strangers who agree to cohabitate on The Real World are more common than not, but it's rarer to see the adventure-seeking alums of Road Rules get bit by the acting bug. Of course, when you're as classically handsome as David Giuntoli, you basically have no choice but to be on TV. So after one season touring the South Pacific on Road Rules (and exactly one season of The Real World/Road Rules Challenge)—where he was the handsome, low-drama nice guy, so MTV didn't have a ton of use for him—Giuntoli veered off into acting, landing the lead role on NBC's demon-hunting series Grimm, which aired for six seasons. Currently, he's starring on ABC's drama A Million Little Things.
24 | Lucy Hale (American Juniors)
ShutterstockIt's kind of wild that Lucy Hale has been a mainstay on television for at least 10 years, first as Aria on Pretty Little Liars and most recently in the title role on The CW's short-lived Riverdale spin-off Katy Keene. But before all that, she was a contestant on American Juniors, Fox's attempt to extend that American Idol magic to talented tweens. She finished in fourth place for the season, performing songs by the likes of Celine Dion, Diana Ross, and Blondie, but nobody who finished higher than she did starred in either Scream 4 or this year's horror offering Fantasy Island, now did they?
25 | Omarosa Manigault Newman (The Apprentice)
ShutterstockLimiting Omarosa Manigault Newman's reality TV credits to just one show is a tough ask, since she's been on three seasons of The Apprentice, The Surreal Life, and Celebrity Big Brother. Before gracing TV screens with her divisive presence, Omarosa's claim to fame was having worked in the Bill Clinton administration. After attaining a degree of reality TV infamy as one of the premier reality villains of all time, Omarosa lined up behind her old Apprentice boss, President Donald Trump, taking a job in his new administration. After being fired less than a year later, Omarosa appeared on Celebrity Big Brother and made headlines with all her gossip about Trump.
26 | Yaya DaCosta (America's Next Top Model)
ShutterstockAfter finishing in second place to eventual Real Housewives of Atlanta star Eva Marcille Sterling (then Pigford) on America's Next Top Model, Yaya DaCosta directed her talents toward the acting field, a smart choice for a woman whose best work on ANTM was her gloriously dramatic prosecution of whoever carved a mean message into the pan of brownies, wrapping up with a request for respeito (Portuguese for "respect") from the other girls. DaCosta found plenty of respeito for her performances in movies like The Kids Are All Right and Lee Daniels' The Butler. She has starred on the NBC drama Chicago Med since its 2015 debut.
27 | Travis Wall (So You Think You Can Dance)
ShutterstockFor any fan of So You Think You Can Dance, Travis Wall was a success the second he stepped out to audition in the show's second season, with his lyrical movements and expressive body language. Wall finished as the runner-up that season, but by Season 5 he'd returned as a choreographer, ultimately becoming one of the show's most celebrated dance creators. These days, Wall's dance and choreography talents can be found in film (Step Up Revolution), TV (All the Right Moves), and off-Broadway productions (Bare, The Wrong Man).
28 | Todrick Hall (American Idol)
ShutterstockLong before he was a recurring performance coach on RuPaul's Drag Race, Todrick Hall was a semifinalist on the 9th season of American Idol. After a performance of Queen's "Somebody to Love" sent him packing just before the finals, Hall went about building a brand for himself the hard way: by singing Disney parodies and doing flash mobs on YouTube. And he managed to be so successful at it that he's been able to book Broadway gigs (Kinky Boots, Chicago), TV roles, and yes, a coveted spot in the Drag Race family. Not to mention the fact that he appeared in and co-executive produced the music video for "You Need to Calm Down," quite a big deal for a Taylor Swift fan.
29 | Katharine McPhee (American Idol)
ShutterstockShould Katharine McPhee have won the 5th season of American Idol? Perhaps. Does her post-Idol career dotted with TV shows, movies, and Broadway success dwarf that of actual winner Taylor Hicks? One could make that argument. After finishing in second place, McPhee released a self-titled debut album and starred alongside Anna Faris and Emma Stone in The House Bunny, but it was truly through the two-season NBC series Smash that McPhee attained pop culture immortality and a place in the camp canon.
30 | Miranda Lambert (Nashville Star)
ShutterstockToday, Miranda Lambert is a major country music star, a Grammy winner, and the winner of more Academy of Country Music Awards than anyone in history. But back in 2003, Lambert finished in third place on the inaugural season of Nashville Star. The show set out to be an American Idol for country music, and Lambert is by far the biggest star to ever emerge from its ranks. The first-season finale of Nashville Star aired in May 2003, and by September, Lambert was signed to Epic Records. Her first album, Kerosene, debuted at the top of the country charts, and there was no looking back from there.
