With the success of the Real Housewives franchise and the likes of Made In Chelsea creating household names like Millie Mackintosh, Spencer Matthews and Jamie Laing, it’s no wonder television companies have once again turned their cameras on Dublin’s jet set.

News has broken of a new reality television show, the pilot of which has already been filmed. The names attached would hint at a series that will be full of high glamour.

Former Miss World Rosanna Davison, interior designer Natasha Rocca Devine, WAG Claudine Keane, public relations gurus Rob Kenny and Avila Lipsett and Avila’s model sister Roz, failed presidential candidate Gareth Sheridan and his wife Heidi, and a number of other south county Dublin scenesters are rumoured to be heading for the small screen in a television series that has been dubbed the new Dublin Wives.

But the news of another attempt to capture the lifestyles of Ireland’s elite on camera raised eyebrows with some of those who had witnessed the fallout from the original.

Dublin Wives hit our screens in 2012 for just one explosive series but became the talk of the town and few who took part came out of the reality show unscathed.

Model Lisa Murphy, socialite Jo Jordan, refrigeration magnate Roz Flanagan, actress-turned-fashion- designer Virginia Macari and the self-styled queen of aesthetics Danielle Meagher, aka Dr Botox, were the key cast members.

By far the most well-known name to take part at the time was Lisa. The glamorous model- turned-beautician had long been in the spotlight after a very public relationship and break-up with dancer Michael Flatley.

Lisa had previously been in a relationship with boxer Joe Egan before she met the super-hoofer on a night out in Lillie’s Bordello in 1999. The pair got engaged a couple of years later and lived together in Flatley’s Castlehyde mansion in Cork.

But unfortunately their love story came to an end. By the time Flatley published his autobiography Lord Of The Dance, in which he stated his intentions to marry Murphy in the epilogue, the couple had already broken up.

However Lisa was soon to find love again in the arms of Gerald Kean, recently divorced and fast becoming known as the solicitor to the stars – due not only to the fact that he was chosen by many celebrities to represent them in legal matters but also that he was often seen in the social pages at events himself.

In 2011, the couple were the victims of a terrifying burglary at their home in Co Wicklow, during which thieves tied Lisa up and stole over €1.5 million of items from the house, including jewellery.

Lisa and Gerald were together in 2012 when Dublin Wives was filmed but their relationship was tempestuous and they split on a number of occasions before finally calling time on their romance in 2016.

On the small screen though, Lisa’s soft and kind nature shone through as she was deemed the peacemaker of the Dublin Wives. Her friendships, particularly with Jo Jordan, lasted beyond the series and far beyond her failed relationships.

However, Lisa never spoke of her former fiances or what happened during their relationships, instead maintaining a dignified silence.

Unfortunately, Lisa was to later remove herself from the spotlight for health reasons. Though rumours swirled that she had been diagnosed with cancer, the beauty therapist kept her situation private but sadly passed away from the illness aged just 51 in February 2024.

After her death, Flatley revealed he had visited Lisa in St Vincent’s Hospital before she passed away.

‘She was a lovely, caring person,’ he said.

Lisa’s untimely passing was not the only tragedy to strike the Dublin Wives. Last year, businesswoman and mother of two boys Jo passed away suddenly at her Dublin home.

Though a stalwart of the Celtic tiger social scene, all skyscraper heels and bouncy blow dries, Jo had made her own luck in life through working hard.

She had her first child at the age of 16 and admitted that she was homeless for a short period before using her entrepreneurial spirit to set up a number of businesses.

When filming started, Jo was living in Castleknock with her then-husband James and their two sons but the couple later split and Jo moved to a house in Ratoath, Co Meath.

During the show, Jo was frank and honest about many things, including her relationship and a breast cancer scare that she was helped through by Lisa.

Jo revealed that, despite the fact that Dublin Wives was only 12 episodes, she didn’t enjoy the celebrity status that went with the show.

In January 2016, she suffered a heart attack which she said was brought on by ‘heartbreak and stress’. She blamed her appearance on the television reality show for some of that stress.

In a 2016 interview, Jo said: ‘Dublin Wives was all fake t**s and big dresses. It was all complete and total b******s. The viewer never really got to see what was going on in our lives. I feel a wreck after the show. I feel like I lost everything doing that show.

‘I’m still getting invitations but I can’t bear to go out because I felt I gave away too much in that show, I was too honest. Everywhere I go, people talk to me about Dublin Wives. It’s left me not trusting anyone. I regret giving away so much about myself.’

Jo said she had signed up for the show because she thought it would be fun but found herself floundering.

‘The spotlight it brought me, I didn’t deal with it well, and the celeb world it showed is just useless, none of it is real,’ she said. ‘This was all because I opened up my life to TV. But I really wasn’t looking for fame.

‘People remember me on Dublin Wives as bubbly but I’m not bubbly any more. I’ve been through some really hard times.’

After retreating from the limelight, on February 7, 2025, Jo passed away suddenly at home.

Although she was already well known for appearing on Podge And Rodge, the then aspiring actress Virginia Macari also exposed a lot more of her life by appearing on Dublin Wives. The chipper heiress was engaged to businessman Kaste Dahl when it was filmed.

She had a fiery relationship with fellow star Danielle, which resulted in an on-screen bust-up.

But later Virginia found herself at the wrong end of the headlines when the Norwegian businessman was questioned by police over a €4 million fraud.

In 2015, while the couple were living in Marbella, Dahl was convicted in a Norwegian court of 17 counts of loan fraud in connection with a holiday cabin property located in southern Norway.

He was handed a sentence of two years and eight months but insisted he wouldn’t do any jail time. At that time he was freed on bail but didn’t return to undertake his sentence and so was classed as a fugitive.

In 2019, Dahl and Virginia had split up and he was arrested by Spanish police to be returned to Norway to serve his time.

Virginia found love again in the form of businessman Peter Smurfit, after meeting him in Monaco. They married in 2024 but there was more drama to come when Virginia collapsed at the home she shared with Peter and her son Thor while working out.

She was rushed to hospital where she was diagnosed with Conus AMV, a rare spinal vascular malformation, for which she needed an operation that in turn left her paralysed in her left leg.

She posted on Instagram shortly after the surgery: ‘Now, I’m in a wheelchair, fighting to relearn how to walk in one of the nation’s top rehab centers. I don’t know if I’ll take my first unassisted steps tomorrow or next year, but I do know that I will walk again.’

Happily, Virginia is back in her skyscraper stilettos again, living a luxurious life in Miami with Peter and Thor.

Also now in the US is Danielle Meagher Collins who, despite the name of the show, was actually single when she took part in filming. Outspoken and controversial, Dr Botox had a knack of rubbing her castmates – Viriginia in particular – up the wrong way. Her razor-sharp wit got her noticed, though, and she was later asked to appear on Celebrity Big Brother.

Though an early adapter of Botox and a leading figure on the Irish scene, Danielle later moved to America, where she currently lives. She has developed a career as a stand-up comedian and in 2024 published her tell-all memoir Diary Of A Botox Bitch.

Last year, she revealed she had discovered that the man she called dad was not actually her real father.

After finding out the truth, she met her biological father Todd in America but he sadly passed away at the age of 61.

At the end of last year, Peter Jackson, the father of rugby player Paddy, was awarded £100,000 in a Belfast court in libel damages relating to posts Danielle had made on social media in 2018. In the Belfast High Court, Master Mark Harvey said of Danielle: ‘She departed for America and has been awkward and difficult throughout this process... she has simply brazened it out.’

It hasn’t been all controversy, however – for some of the Dublin Wives, life has been a lot less complicated. The least controversial of all, Roz Flanagan is now a glamorous granny, spending her time between Marbella and Ireland.

At the time of Dublin Wives, Roz and her husband Vincent were running a refrigeration business together. The couple got together when Roz was 16, got married when she was 20 and they have been solid as a rock ever since.

In 2023, the couple sold their business to a British firm and now Roz continues to live the high life with Vincent at her side. Their three grown-up daughters are married and Roz is now a doting grandmother.

She has also managed to remain out of the spotlight since the Dublin Wives cameras stopped rolling.

Despite the happy ending for Roz, Rosanna and her crew might do well to bear in mind what happened to the Dublin Wives when they opened up their lives to the television cameras.

Because for many, sometimes the price of fame, however fleeting, is simply not worth it.