Alex McCord and Simon Van Kempen Make Last-Ditch Plea for Their Real Housewives Lives

Forget Real—Alex McCord and Simon Van Kempen are becoming desperate Housewives.

After being booted off The Real Housewives of New York City last week along with castmates Jill Zarin, Kelly Bensimon and Cindy Barshop, the couple are fighting for their reality-TV lives, attempting to sway the powers that be to stay on the show and still collect a paycheck from Bravo.

So what's their latest scheme?

As of last night, Alex and unofficial Housewife No. 6, Simon, were planning to head to Bravo HQ in New York today to meet with reality honcho Andy Cohen and producers to make a last-ditch bid to remain on the show in some capacity.

"Basically, they've been begging to stay on. Simon questions how he can 'harness the swell of support' behind them," says a source to Bravo. "They're not accepting that it's done. They are meeting with Bravo this afternoon and Bravo doesn't want them on the show, but Andy would like them to pop up occasionally, whether on Housewives or other programs on the network is what they're saying."

Bravo has declined to comment on the behind-the-scenes goings-on.

Meanwhile, we've also learned that castmember Jill will be headed off to sail on a cruise ship called The World for a week for some downtime following her firing.

"She was in Nashville dropping her daughter off at school and now she's going to relax," says our source.

"She still feels a little betrayed. Jill knew Carole [Radziwill] was coming on the show, but she never knew she was being thrown off. She's grateful for what Bravo did for her, but feels they just tossed her aside."

Too bad they can't turn this stuff into a reality series. Talk about must-see TV!