The “real” Tyra Banks was missing from Netflix’s new doc, “Reality Check: Inside America’s Next Top Model,” according to former pal and judge Jay Manuel.
“We see prepared television Tyra. I know the real woman. I know her struggles. I know what she has fought in this industry,” Manuel told Sherri Shepherd on an upcoming episode of “Sherri,” airing Tuesday, Feb. 24.
Manuel and fellow judges, Nigel Barker and Miss J Alexander, appear in the doc, along with a few of the model contestants, where they look back on the reality show’s complicated legacy.
The three judges appeared together on “Sherri,” their first sit-down interview as a trio since the doc premiered on Monday.
The doc reveals Banks’ estrangement from the three, who were all once close pals with the supermodel-turned-“Smize & Dream” ice cream entrepreneur.
In Manuel’s case, their relationship changed after he tried to leave the show in 2007, and she responded with an email that read: “I am disappointed.”
Their communication off-camera halted and Manuel told Shepherd that Banks completely shut him out. (Manuel was on the show starting in its inaugural season in 2003 and wound up staying on until after cycle 18 in 2012, when Barker and Alexander were also let go.)
“That was a very strained relationship because she wouldn’t talk to me when the cameras weren’t rolling, and still, to this day, that really hurts,” he said.
Banks refused to talk about their fall out when asked about their relationship in the documentary, only saying she should give him a ring. It’s a call Manuel says he has yet to receive, nor is he waiting by the phone.
Banks teased a cycle 25 of “ANTM” at the end of the doc, but when Shepherd asked the trio if they’d return, Manuel responded, “If we’re going to be real… I don’t think I’m getting that phone call.”
Alexander responded by giving one of one his iconic, meme-worthy stares.
Alexander is recovering from a 2022 stroke, revealing in the doc that Banks did not visit him while he was in the hospital. “She just sent me a text that she wants to come and visit me,” he said.
As for Barker?
“Some things are best left just as they were… Millions upon millions upon hundreds of millions thoroughly enjoyed watching ‘America’s Next Top Model’ … Take the good, the bad, the ugly, remember the positive things. Be kind out there to all people,” he said.
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