Ariana and a Vanderpump Rules Producer Break Down Her Intense Finale Showdown with Tom Sandoval
Find out why Ariana “felt a little bit satisfied” during the emotionally charged confrontation.
There was no shortage of shocking moments on the Vanderpump Rules Season 10 finale, but one of the most memorable came when Tom Sandoval and Ariana Madix finally sat down one-on-one and unpacked his affair with Raquel Leviss.
The conversation would’ve been intense under any circumstances, but as Vanderpump Rules executive producer Alex Baskin told Variety, there’s a reason things blew up the way they did: Ariana and Tom were “cohabiting the same space, but not really talking to each other,” so that scene “was one of the first times that they had spoken to each other since she found out about the relationship with Raquel.”
Naturally, Ariana unloaded on Tom. “I’ve been with you for nine years, back when you lived with [Tom] Schwartz and we became friends. When you were literally, like, wearing combat boots and skinny jeans, and didn’t have a dime to your name, driving a 1997 Honda Civic. I loved you then, when you had nothing,” she said on the finale. “You got a little bit of money, a little bar, a little band, and then this girl’s, like, gonna act enamored with you? Like, ‘Oh my god. He’s so… aw!’ ’Cause that’s what you want, huh? You want someone to just gas you up. That girl is searching for identity in men. She has no identity of her own. Willing to stoop so low as to f-ck one of her best friends’ life partners and that’s someone you think is, like, a good person you should be around?”
Ariana and Sandoval eventually found themselves in a shouting match, and while reflecting on the emotionally charged conversation with The New York Times, Ariana said she was ultimately glad the conversation unfolded the way it did.
“When he sat down on that couch and tried to give the sad sack act, I knew he was going to try to sell a bit,” she explained. “I knew he was trying to be that person so that I would be the angry person; I could see what was happening in front of my face, and it was really frustrating. Honestly, when he started yelling at me, I felt a little bit satisfied that he was finally going to be the real him.”
Emotions continued to run high throughout the finale episode as the rest of the Vanderpump Rules cast grappled with the affair. And everyone admitted to being shocked — even Katie Maloney and Lala Kent, who had previously raised suspicions about Sandoval and Raquel.
Baskin was even more astonished though, because he never believed there was actually something going on between the two. “It obviously was something that was discussed,” he said. “But we didn’t take it that seriously, because it just seemed so far-fetched and so devious. And so, I’m an idiot! I was completely dismissive of it.”
To be fair, Ariana was too. As she shared on Watch What Happens Live with Andy Cohen, she didn’t believe that Sandoval was cheating with Raquel up until the very moment she found evidence on his phone. “I wasn’t suspicious about an affair or about [Raquel], but I was like, something was clearly going on with him mentally,” Ariana said, “and that’s what I was picking up on.”
Stay tuned for more revelations to come on the three-part Vanderpump Rules Season 10 reunion, kicking off Wednesday, May 24.
