Credit: O’Connor/AFF-USA.com / MEGA, Todd Williamson/Bravo
Howie Mandel made an agreement not to challenge Tom Sandoval before he welcomed the Vanderpump Rules star to his podcast, Howie Mandel Does Stuff, last month.
While appearing on the podcast of another reality star, The Bachelor alum Nick Viall, on Tuesday, the comedian revealed he spoke to a member of Sandoval’s band, Tom Sandoval & the Most Extras, before Sandoval gave him his first post-“Scandoval” interview while also reacting to Andy Cohen deeming him a “jackhole” on Watch What Happens Live.
“I was a jackhole, I’m a jackhole on Watch What Happens – Andy Cohen said I’m a jackhole, [and] I think that’s positive,” Howie said on the May 2 episode of The Viall Files, via Page Six. “[I] just like to have a title.”
According to Howie, “Bravo hates [him],” and the backlash he’s received from Pump Rules fans, many of whom have felt he took it far too easy on the cheating reality star, has been “really intense.”
During an episode of WWHL last month, Andy targeted Howie, saying he “didn’t do his homework” before he interviewed Sandoval about his affair with Raquel Leviss, a close friend of both him and his now-ex-girlfriend of nine years, Ariana Madix.
“Howie, you have to be careful before you take a side,” Andy warned. “Bravo fans are very passionate.”
But as Howie explained, “My homework was talking to him, and I wanna hear this story, I wanna hear why it’s so big.”
Also during the interview, after admitting he’s now a “fan” of Lala Kent, who he described as “funny and interesting” after she shaded the “f-cking random” interview on her Instagram Story, and saying he still doesn’t know who Scheana Shay is, Howie revealed the details of his deal.
“The problem between me and my daughter here is my daughter is a huge Vanderpump Rules fan who watches and knows everything so the tough thing was, and I said to her, and we had this discussion: I go, ‘You can’t. You can’t. If you hear something you don’t agree with, you can’t challenge. There are no challenges on this particular moment. We’re not challenging. That’s not what this is about,'” Howie explained, as seen in a clip shared by Bravo Snark Side on Instagram.
“Did you promise Tom that?” Nick asked.
“Yeah,” Howie confirmed. “I promised… I didn’t talk to Tom directly. But as people have found out, one of the people that works for me is married to his road manager and drummer [for Tom Sandoval & the Most Extras].”
“I’m not gonna put him in an uncomfortable position,” he continued. “I said, ‘Come on. You wanna speak? You wanna talk? Come on and talk.’ And my point is, and the reason I wanted to is because, and still don’t, understand, which is kind of a misinterpretation by the Bravo fans for me, what are they saying? That I condone this kind of behavior?”
“Yeah,” Howie’s daughter and co-host, Jackelyn Shultz, replied. “[They thought] that when you said that you didn’t think it was a big deal, they thought you meant that it wasn’t a big deal that he cheated, rather than he doesn’t understand the hoopla around it, why it’s even getting to him who doesn’t watch.”
Agreeing with Jackelyn, Howie went on to say that he doesn’t understand the ongoing coverage of “Scandoval.”
“When I watch CNN or I watch the… anything, why is this cheating scandal making and breaking outside of [the Bravo universe]?” he asked. “I don’t understand being mad at me now and I don’t understand why it is as big as it is.”
Vanderpump Rules season 10 airs Wednesdays at 9/8c on Bravo.