Tom Sandoval, the Vanderpump Rules star made headlines six weeks ago when it was revealed he had cheated on his partner of nine years, Ariana Madix, by carrying on a month-long secret affair with fellow cast member Raquel Leviss (herself was the ex-girlfriend of another cast member, James Kennedy) broke her silence.
It’s no simple matter: it’s Scandoval, the paradigm-shattering, Bravo-altering adultery fiasco that has motivated every current and former VPR cast member scramble their podcast of choice in the air their side of things.
Sandoval chose Howie Mandel as his sympathetic ear, and it quickly became clear why: Mandel had never seen Vanderpump Rules in his life and has no idea what’s going on, which clears the runway for Schwartz and the Sandy’s Lounge co-owner to say absolutely insane things without a fight.
“I love Ariana, I still love Ariana and I care about her, but we, for a while, have our own lives,” Sandoval told Mandel. “Nine years, we obviously built a business and have a house together, we are a brand. Like many relationships, it’s like becoming best friends, family, sometimes roommates. There are many ways that relationship lacks intimacy, connection.
“I take it—you know, Ken and Lisa, they don’t have sex all the time,” Sandoval said, referring to Ken Todd and Lisa Vanderpump of Vanderpump Rules. “I get porn, I can crack one in the bathroom. But there are so many other perks! Brand building, everything, the image of it all.
What stage of narcissism is this? Late stage, or ultra-late stage?
Sandoval was Leviss’ first friend, he said, and admired him so much, he tried to set him up with his close friend Tom Schwartz because he found out he was but unbelievable.
When Sandoval and Leviss shared their “magnetic” first kiss, she said she “got it [his] ass” in therapy to try to cope, but their connection is undeniable, the need to be together wins out.
PLEASE. You are HORNY.
“You had a long relationship [Madix], and it happens to a lot of people and it happens to everybody, it’s not your fault either of you, you’re drifting apart,” Mandel said sadly to Sandoval, which was a wonderful way to excuse what was happening. “What I’m asking is, you know that, you know it inside, have you ever sat down and said it’s not working?”
Sandoval said that he had, for a long time, planted the seeds of a breakup for Madix in couples therapy, subliminally saying that he wanted to break up with her without actually breaking up with her.
“I was seeing Raquel as often as I could, which I know sounds horrible, and FaceTiming her all the time, and like, Ariana didn’t really notice, because our lives were just so separate,” said Sandoval.
Finally, Sandoval said, he officially dumped Madix two weeks before he accidentally discovered the affair with Leviss.
“I sat down to talk to him again, and he was like, ‘I’m not going to let you leave me, you have to force me out of this relationship,’ and I was like, ‘Ariana, I don’t think I can be honest in a relationship with you now,’” Sandoval told Mandel. “He was like, ‘If you break up with me, you’re effectively ending my life.’ I do not know what to do. He’s in total denial and he’s not accepting it.”
“But we’re on break,” Sandoval said the night Madix discovered their relationship with Leviss. “He knows we’re on a break.” BE TRUE.
