Credit: Bravo
Raquel Leviss opened up about her final Vanderpump Rules scene with Tom Sandoval and his upsetting betrayal during part two of her interview on Bethenny Frankel‘s podcast.
In addition to suggesting she’s “in debt” and slamming Scheana Shay‘s lies about her alleged assault, Raquel, 28, shared that Sandoval, 40, demanded a scene from the season 10 finale be removed by producers before he was offered his own producer credit for season 11.
“He’s not technically a producer. [But] he’s been on the series from day one, season one,” Raquel explained on the August 17 episode of Just B With Bethenny. “I don’t know if I’m even able to disclose this information but he did tell me during negotiations for season 11, he was offered a producer credit for season 11.”
According to Raquel, she not only believes the offer suggested that Sandoval was being rewarded for their affair — but also that the entire thing was produced for buzz.
“I think he was being rewarded for the Scandoval of it all and to me that’s just kinda gross because it seems… It makes me skeptical. Like, was this really just something that was fabricated for this end result?” she wondered.
Raquel also noted that while Sandoval has certainly seen backlash for cheating on Ariana Madix, 38, she’s had it much worse.
“I think he’s getting a lot of hate right now just being pompous and being around town with a bunch of different girls but I feel like it’s true, the woman does get the short end of the stick.”
Moving on to her reported run-in with Scheana, 38, who she accused of punching her after learning of her and Sandoval’s affair during a trip to New York City in March, Raquel insisted she was assaulted.
“Scheana did physically assault me that night, and I have a permanent scar on my eyebrow,” Raquel stated. “At the moment, I thought I deserved it. That’s why I just stood there and let it happen. She pushed me as hard as she could against a brick wall, the back of my head hit the wall pretty hard, and then she socked me in the eye and I was in shock. She threw my phone in the street and then called Ariana from her phone and I immediately ran to my phone.”
Looking back, Raquel said she called Sandoval immediately to tell him she’d been punched.
“And he was like, ‘Oh, I know, I heard her say to Ariana, “I punched that b*tch in her face and threw her phone in the street.”‘ So it’s just nuts that she’s doubled down on this narrative that I’m a liar and a cheat and I completely fabricated this assault,” Raquel continued. “I don’t think that filing a restraining order was out of question because she was making this like, punch emoji on a post that she made with Ariana, saying like, ‘I’ve always got your back.’ I didn’t feel safe so it’s just unfortunate that I’ve been… I don’t know. It just doesn’t make sense to me how I can be assaulted and still have so much vitriol.”
After Bethenny spoke of the way in which Bravo profited exponentially from “Scandoval,” Raquel shockingly shared that she’s “in debt” (though Lisa Vanderpump, 62, said Wednesday that she was paid $361,000 for season 10).
She then explained that Sandoval betrayed her by filming their NSFW FaceTime session without her consent.
“I felt very betrayed. I felt like I couldn’t trust this person. I felt like my privacy didn’t matter to him and he didn’t really give a good excuse besides he wanted me to see it later on to see how beautiful I was. But if he would have asked for permission, I would have said no,” she stated.
And while fans didn’t see it, she actually confronted him with cameras rolling.
“When Tom and I were filming at my apartment after filming got picked back up, I said to Tom, ‘How could I trust you? You filmed me without my consent?’ And he admitted to it but then after that scene wrapped he said, ‘Why did you say that? Why did you say that on camera? You made me look bad,’ and I was like, ‘Well, because that’s what happened.’ And he ended up boycotting filming the rest of Scandoval so that he could have editing rights to that scene to take out that specific piece,” she revealed.
Vanderpump Rules season 11 is expected to begin airing on Bravo sometime later this year or in early 2024.