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Tampa Baes is here, unapologetically queer, and about to be your new fave reality show.
If you’re craving a new TV obsession, we have good news. Tampa Baes, the new docuseries coming to Prime Video, drops this Friday — and you’re going to love it. It’s fun, heartwarming, and the drama is just as messy as you could hope for.
The eight-episode docuseries focus on a group of queer women who are friends (and frenemies) just living their best lesbian life in Tampa Bay.
These friendships predate the show, so the interconnected relationships between the women are complicated and the drama is real. That was important to executive producer and showrunner Melissa Bidwell and her co-executive producer Paul O’Malley, both of whom identify as members of the LGBTQ+ community. “When we heard about this group of friends in Tampa Bay, a true hidden gem for the LGBTQ+ community, we were blown away by how interesting each of the baes are,” Bidwell previously told The Advocate.
“Some of the first shows I worked on were shows like The Real World and Road Rules where we’d roll for hours hoping to get something interesting,” recalls Bidwell. “This was not the case with Tampa Baes. On our first day of filming, we quickly realized this was not an ordinary group of friends — like every group, some are closer than others and some have major drama. They have real history including fallouts, past romantic relationships, and entanglements.”
The series centers around Cuppie, a Tampa Bay native who’s returned home after moving away for an ill-fated romance and is ready to get back out there and start dating again. She also serves as the connection between two couples, Haley and Brianna and Marissa and Summer (and their respective entourages), who are immersed in a kind of “it-couple” cold war that’s about to turn hot. Sides are taken, loyalties are tested, and a few hearts are even broken. This is all to say it’s compelling viewing.
Tampa Baes premieres November 5 on Amazon Prime. Check out the trailer below.
Rachel Shatto, Editor in Chief of PRIDE.com, is an SF Bay Area-based writer, podcaster, and former editor of Curve magazine, where she honed her passion for writing about social justice and sex (and their frequent intersection). Her work has appeared on Dread Central, Elite Daily, Tecca, and Joystiq. She's a GALECA member and she podcasts regularly about horror on the Zombie Grrlz Horror Podcast Network. She can’t live without cats, vintage style, video games, drag queens, or the Oxford comma.
Rachel Shatto, Editor in Chief of PRIDE.com, is an SF Bay Area-based writer, podcaster, and former editor of Curve magazine, where she honed her passion for writing about social justice and sex (and their frequent intersection). Her work has appeared on Dread Central, Elite Daily, Tecca, and Joystiq. She's a GALECA member and she podcasts regularly about horror on the Zombie Grrlz Horror Podcast Network. She can’t live without cats, vintage style, video games, drag queens, or the Oxford comma.
