Alana ‘Honey Boo Boo’ Thompson is looking for the money she says she’s owed from working on reality TV for years as a child, but the math ain’t mathin’!
So, in a March episode of Mama June: Family Crisis, the 18-year-old confronted her 44-year-old momma Mama June Shannon about money supposedly missing from her Coogan Account, which is a special bank account set up for child actors. Alana had been expecting six figures to be in that account due to all the on-screen work she did growing up. But when she checked it during the ep, she found only $33,000. Yikes! And now, Mama June is speaking out about where that money went! …Uh, well, kind of!
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During the episode last month, Alana slammed her embattled momma for her TV salary money being missing:
“There should at least be six figures in that account! Something’s not adding up. My money is somewhere. It needs to be found right now, ASAP. Because this is not gonna work.”
But according to Mama June, the money numbers actually do make sense! Speaking to ET on Tuesday, June explained that Alana made about $60,000 on Dancing With The Stars: Juniors back in 2018. Then, after California taxes and Georgia taxes pulled out their shares, Honey Boo Boo was left with about $35,000. Financial experts guided her to put 20 percent of that total into Alana’s Coogan Account. Then, more money was deposited into the Coogan Account from brief TV stints on The Beach Ball and The Masked Singer, both in 2019. June explained to ET this week:
“Alana has around over $200,000 that she has access to but she is choosing not to have access to. She is making those decisions because she’s 18. So there’s more, there’s definitely more money out there.”
So, wait, Alana has access to it, and she has stated that she wants it, but she is “choosing not to have access” to it? Huh?? Make it make sense!
The on-screen argument went on from there last month. At one point, June told Alana that she should be happy to have even $33,000 at her age, as most 18-year-olds start their adult life with nothing! Which, yeah, maybe… but Alana has been working throughout her childhood!! And she rightly clapped back about that:
“Yeah, but I’ve been on TV since I was six, and now, I have what to show for it?”
Not wrong!!! Speaking to ET now about that past on-camera interaction this week, June explained bizarrely that she “didn’t really” steal any money from her daughter:
“I didn’t really steal any money. You will see on Friday, you know, like it’s not hundreds of thousands of dollars that is in question, it’s only one show and that’s Dancing With the Stars.”
Uh, that’s quite the teaser for Friday’s forthcoming episode. The “really” in “I didn’t really steal any money” would seem to be doing quite a bit of work! LOLz!! We can’t wait to hear the explanation on that one…
In the end, the money problem has created quite a rift between Alana and her momma. The younger woman is studying right now at Regis University in Denver. In another past Mama June: Family Crisis ep, she told her momma not to come visit her in the Mile High City because of all this. Ouch!! And yet June told ET on Tuesday that she is still visiting her famous daughter despite that request:
“I have been out there. Something my kids told me four years ago and back in December… they said, ‘well, hey, we want you to keep showing up even if we don’t want you to show up’ and I keep doing that no matter if we’re fighting or we aren’t getting along or there’s some controversy.”
Hmmm. Well, OK. We’re just more concerned about the allegedly missing money!! Alana deserves what she’s earned after years of growing up on camera!! Reactions, Perezcious readers?? Are you going to tune in on Friday at 9:00 p.m. ET on WEtv to see how this plays out??
[Image via ET/YouTube]