Mention It All - 1 Step Forward, 3 Steps Back (VPR)

Episode Date: March 8, 2024

It’s Wednesday, and you know what that means: Tom Sandoval’s misguided martyr tour continues! Before sinking his teeth into the new Vanderpump Rules ep, Dylan shares a troubling update on Tom Schwartz’s personal life, and reflects on how old this cast has gotten. Then, he returns to Tahoe, where Scheana is put through the ringer, Sandoval still hasn’t learned to shut up, and Hippie (FKA Graham) makes his social media re-debut. Meanwhile, back in LA, the Something About Her storyline is getting staler than yesterday’s baguette. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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See Store Online for details. Betches Media presents. Ha ha, laugh, funny. Mention It All, a Bravo by Betches podcast. We don't say that, but now we said it. With me, Dylan Hafer. Who don't check me, though? Hey, everyone.

Welcome back to the Mention at All podcast. I'm Dylan Hafer. It's Wednesday morning. It's very rainy in New York City. Actually, that might be a lie. I don't know if it's raining outside right now. I think it's gonna. It's Van der Pumperul's time.

We do it. Wednesday. You know the drill. This week's episode in Tahoe, they're kind of cooking with some gas, I think. The last couple weeks have been a little bit bumpy, a little bit slow, a little bit, a little bit what's going on, what are we doing here? What's the what's the tea? And I think this week, the soil was fertile. That's what I'll say. But first, I have to speak about this page six headline that I'm looking at, which is breaking my soul a little bit in the words of Beyonce. Here's the headline. Tom Schwartz, 41.

Spark's dating rumors with 23-year-old recent college grad. Oh my God, you guys. Tom Schwartz, 41, sparks dating rumors with 23-year-old recent college grad. college grad. Okay, first of all, this is a classic, like, a little bit shady page six headline where they're like, we're going to tell you her age in the headline and we're also going to note that, like, did you know, a 23 year old is about the age that someone is after graduating from college? Like, okay. Yes. But also, like, don't you, don't you kind of forget that Tom Schwartz is 41? I feel like we made such a big deal out of Jack's turning.

40, what was it, like 12 years ago now, that then when the rest of them started hitting 40, it kind of got swept past where it was like, okay, like, you know, most of the women aren't 40 yet, like Kristen Doty's 40, but like Sheena, Ariana, Katie, I think, are all still in their 30s. Tom Schwartz is 41, 41. Not that there's anything, you know, 41, it's a great age. But is it a great age to be dating a 23-year-old? So here's what's happening. He has sparked dating rumors with this young woman, Sophia Scoro. After she has posted a couple of TikToks of them together, they were in Vegas, they were

at a restaurant in L.A. They seemed to be sort of traveling together. I don't know. So there's no, like, confirmed relationship. But they're clearly, they're clearly spending some time together. Schwartz did say on Watch What Happens Live last month that he was not dating but hanging out with someone and that they, she, he didn't want to put his relationship in the spotlight. But Sophia has been the one posting these TikToks. And according, this is what Page 6 says. According to Skoro's social media pages, she works as a vintage designer curator and graduated from the University of Oregon in June 22. Oh, like this girl was still in college when Tom and Katie. announced they were getting divorced.

Woof. It's just I'm not even somebody who really like gives a fuck about age gap relationship discourse. Like I personally, I find it very boring. Like if you're 30 and you're dating

somebody who's like 24, you'll see people on Twitter or TikTok be like, not. That's problematic. And I'm like, who cares? life is short. You love who you love is love is love. Like Lin-Manuel Miranda. Love is love, is love.

Like, I just don't find it that exciting to like police somebody else's relationship norms. But like 41 and 23, it just feels a little bit like why. I think that's the thing for me. It's not, it's not like, it's not just like, oh, like, that's so creepy or that's so weird. It's just like, if you are a 41 year old man who has been married and divorce it, the fact that you're like getting back out there into the dating scene and you're like, okay, who am I going to relate to the most and spend, enjoy spending all my time with and whatever and what you love. land on is like a girl who was a sophomore in college during the pandemic. It just, I don't know. I don't know.

I mean, Schwartz is perhaps not the most mature person we've ever had on our TV screens. So maybe maturity-wise, they're on a similar level. I still think that doesn't make it feel not weird. But whatever, maybe we'll be seeing Sophia next season on Vanderpump rules. I can't wait to see how she wriggles her way into like a serving job at Sir. Or maybe she's like bus tables at Tom Tom. Who knows? We all got to start somewhere.

And, you know, the somewhere where we're starting today is in Tahoe. This trip, I thought got off to kind of like a flop-ish start. Like last week I just wasn't really, it wasn't like giving much. that first dinner where Lisa was there. I think Lisa being there didn't help the demolition wall where it's like motherfucking Scandivall. Like that fell flat. But this episode we get a few really interesting sort of one-on-one dynamics, some really

fascinating confrontations. And to watch Tom Sandoval going through this. like push and pull of he, he like desperately wants people to like him again, to be back sort of in the good graces of the group. But at the same time, there are certain things that he just can't stop himself from saying and doing to work against that goal. I think it's kind of riveting. Like I think it's from a viewer perspective,

watching the push and pull between him and Sheena and him and Lala and him and Brock. And I mean, pretty much everyone in this group has a sort of moment where it's like something's not clicking with Tom. And he can't just say what he needs to say and then shut up. and move forward. It's like if you want to move forward, in a lot of ways, you hold the keys to that gate.

But if you're putting the key in the lock and turning it halfway, and then lighting the whole gate on fire, you're still not going to be able to drive past the gate. What is this metaphor? What gate am I talking about? Putting a key in a lock? I don't know.

Got it. I'm like, I don't know what's going on here. But so we start off. It's a new day in Tahoe. The sun is shining. The birds are chirping. Schwartz saw, Blue Jay, the biggest one he's ever seen. Congratulations.

There's this meditation thing happening. This woman is there to lead it. She bless her heart. She seems like a nice lady. But this meditation, I am, I have. some feelings about this whole situation. First of all, I don't consider myself to be a very meditative person. This might come as a shock to all of you. I'm not great at following someone else's guidance to achieve a personal breakthrough. And like, if I need to do some work,

on myself, I feel like I will, I'll, I'll get to it, like I'll handle it. Maybe not always. I mean, there are certain situations where it's like, yes, you should like talk to someone or like, ask for advice. But I don't know that like random blonde lady in Tahoe walking us through our trauma is really like the way that I would go about like making productive change in my life. The exercise that they're doing where they're sitting back to back and breathing and are you okay and then looking in each other's eyes. Paring Sheena and Sandoval together, it just feels manipulative because we have, this whole season, we've seen Sheena really struggling and really, I think, actively trying to process and work through all of the shit that's gone down

with Tom and with Ariana and with the whole group over the last few months, with Raquel Rachel. And this to me felt like a situation. I don't know if Meditation Lady was briefed by producers or if Sandoval was like, hey, can you pair me and Sheena together? It just felt like Sheena was kind of set up. And I, look, I think Shishu can do bad all by herself. You know, she can make questionable decisions and she can have flawed judgment. And sure, she can be a flip-flopper sometimes.

but let her do it on her own terms. Don't be like, hey, Sheena, actually, you really should be sitting down and, um, and feeling the physical connection with Tom Sandoval right now, because that's what, that's what this activity is about. It's like, can you let the girl live? She's like having a, she's having like a mini, mentee be. Brock got home six hours late from fucking golfing at the other end of the lake when he's like, yeah, we were all the way down at the,

the, you know, sat ta-ha. And the meditation lady is like, wow, that's far. Brock, get back to the house. You're on the clock here. So she is already mad about that. She's like freaking out because she tells us that in the pandemic when she didn't have any money and nothing was coming in, that Sandoval just PayPaled her thousands of dollars one day, like no questions asked. That was news to me. Maybe I don't know if she's ever talked about it anywhere else.

I was like, oh, damn. Sheena's complicated feelings about this whole situation are completely valid. The choices that she makes based on those feelings, I may or may not agree with, and those might be more questionable. But I think the complexity of her feelings makes complete sense. And so it's a little, I feel like she's already sort of doing the work to get through it. And so to have like meditation lady kind of, you know, like juicing the numbers on that, it's like, we're good. Thank you.

And Tom is sort of like, hey, uh, so like all, all things considered are you okay? And like now can we make our weird forced eye contact? And then when she, she like needs a minute, she leaves. Like that seems like the healthy choice to me. And then Brock chases after. And he's like, Shana, I mean, that really could have been like a minute to, you know, have a moment with you. too. And she's like, sorry in the pair's meditation that I was kind of hoping to be paired with my husband. And he's like, yeah, but like, I thought, I thought that you were supposed to have that

moment we send a whole. The Brock voice is too much, you guys. I'm sorry. I don't know where that's coming from. I feel like I'm like, I'm like in Dune, like, use the voice. Sheena, talk to Tendiful. Get closure. I don't know. It just feels like these guys are trying to make it harder for Sheena than it needs to be. So good, so good.

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And she says that she still just, she doesn't understand what he did to Ariana. That their, you know, their one-on-one relationship is, is one thing, but that she still can't, like, wrap her mind around this. And Tom just is like, well, I don't know if, you know, you know, maybe you don't, if you don't understand, maybe you don't understand. And she was like, I don't know if I need to understand. Tom still seems to feel like there is a version of events in his mind where he didn't really do anything that wrong. And that if he unlocks whatever narrative so the rest of the group can see it, that suddenly they'll understand that like there's still some, there's just some piece of that they're missing, where it's like, my relationship with Ariana wasn't good, and

Raquel and I weren't specifically trying to hurt you guys. And it's like, specifically, it doesn't matter. Specifically, you did it. You created this situation with Raquel, who is, you know, has removed herself for the narrative. So obviously that doesn't, it doesn't help that Tom is like burdened now with being the only bad guy left in the room. But at the same time, that doesn't make it Sheena's fault that he was the bad guy. It's complicated. I think it's okay that it's complicated and it's okay that Tom is frustrated with how certain things have gone down. But at the same time, like, I think he's still, and I feel like, you know, I feel a little bit like broken record, but like every week we've gotten at least one scene where he just kind of, he comes close to, to, to,

taking accountability, to saying the right thing, to really apologizing. But then he can't stop himself from kind of walking it back and being like, yeah, okay, what I did was wrong. But what you did was worse. And it's like, my man, my guy, shut the fuck up. Just shut up. It's very, I was, I was listening to the Olivia Rod. Rodrigo song, one step forward, three steps back. And I feel like that's like the Tom Sandoval theme song for this season. Like when they're in the gond, so they go to this gondola.

The, there's, the tombs and Brock are in a gondola together. And they're like, oh, so how was the meditation thing for you? And then Sandoval is talking about how like, sheena's OCD diagnosis makes a lot of sense because she's like so laser focused on hating him. And I'm like, okay, this is, let's not. I'm just, I'm kind of, I'm kind of obsessed with Sandoval making Sheena's OCD about him. Where it's like, it's like some people when they have OCD, they like, count their steps or they're flipping the light switch 12 times she just can't stop thinking about how much she hates me

like I'm not a medical professional but I don't think that's how that works he's like he's like yeah she has to look over her shoulder six times you know chew her gum to the beat and also talk about how she hates me like are you for real he's still saying to Brock that he and Raquel didn't try to hurt the group and Brock is like, bro, your girl put a restraining order on her. Like, okay, maybe you weren't thinking about it when you had the seven month long affair. That's a long time to not think about it, but whatever. But like, you still weren't trying to hurt the group when you filed a restraining order.

He's like, yeah, but she punched her in the face. and I will just remind Tom Sandeval one more time that Sheena, because she has long nails, physically cannot make a fist. We know this. This is a fact. This is, that is just science. That is physics. Is that physics?

Like, matter. Like, because Sheena's nails are like hard, solid matter. And they can't, I don't know if it's physics. I haven't taken physics in like a decade. But shut up. Shut up. So much of this episode is. just comes down to Tom needing to shut the fuck up.

His argument with Lala later. They're on the boat. Shut the fuck up. I think, look, and this is another situation where just like with Sheena, there are legitimate things that you can dislike about Lala or that you can take issue with the way she handles things. But I think when she sits down with Tom and she's like, can I just ask you a question? First of all, how dare you?

It's very like in the office, like Toby's exit interview when Michael sits down with him and he doesn't know Holly's going to be in the room and he's like, first question, who do you think you are? Second question, what gives you the right? Wait, speaking of Holly from the office, I'm seeing doubt on Broadway tonight, and Amy Ryan, who played Holly is like the main woman. I'm excited, whatever. Literally has nothing to do with anything.

But Tom, like, all La La Wants is like an appellant is like an apology for Tom being a fucking hypocrite when he was in the press literally the day that he got caught having a seven month long affair saying that la la is fake and la la is lies and whatever and it's like all you have to do is just say like that was shitty you're right leave it there instead he he cannot stop himself from going back to well la la you were in a six year relationship and you lied for half of it, so we're the same. Let's call it a wash. The fact that he's like bringing on a meditation lady,

it's like, no, what you actually should have done before this season, before this trip, before whatever, literally, okay, first of all, maybe like anger management, I don't, I don't know much about that, but like it seems like he could be a candidate. But also just like sit down with somebody, not even a therapist. Like a literally these people need like a reality TV strategist. Like a reality TV relationship coach to talk through their relationships with everyone on the cast, the potential issues, the potential triggers, the potential, you know, dynamics that could come up before the season. This actually, make a note of this.

I need to start marketing my services. A two-hour session to go over everything to say, okay. So I understand that you have this issue with this person in the cast. I understand that if they bring it up, you're going to want to say this. You're going to want to escalate it here. You're going to want to bring up the fact that Lala in the past wasn't honest about her own relationship. But here's the thing. If you bring that up in this situation, it's going to make you look a petty.

B, like you're not actually taking accountability for what you did wrong. You're just trying to kind of go tit for tat. And C, it's going to make you look like you don't actually want to meaningfully move forward with this group because you're still focused on the past. And I feel like in every instance, Tom needs somebody in his ear sort of explaining saying, hey, you're totally got how you're feeling. Love that. In this moment, it's not going to serve you to bring this up. Like, maybe there needs to be like a text hotline where like in between scenes, you can be like, man, la-la's being a bitch. How should I respond? It's like, don't take the bait. Just say, you're sorry. I could make millions off this. I really,

I've always said that people should have reunion strategists. Fuck it. You need a strategist for the whole season. Does this already exist? Somebody must do this. A consultant? I don't know what consulting is, really. Like, if somebody tells me they work for like BCG as a consultant, I'm like, great. So what do you do?

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Visit red bull.com slash bright summer ahead to learn more. See you this summer. Do you want to talk about it. So that's pretty much everything that happens in Tahoe. You know, there's like a little boat day. Schwartz is explaining to the crew how they like rebranded the dog. Graham now hippie. James, James Hard launches his ownership of the dog.

On Instagram, that's brave. But I do want to talk about what's happening back in L. L.A. with Katie and Ariana. Because, so we get a scene, they're having lunch. They're talking about Sheena. You know, there's like mixed feelings there. But then we get another scene where they're conducting job interviews for front of house positions at something about her. And I just, here's the thing. Something about her, as you may or may not know, has still not, opened. It's now March 6th. I did just have to check the date. This was filmed in June, July of last year. So these interviews can't have actually led to anything. I'm not saying

they were fake at the time. I'm just saying like these people definitely aren't still like, nobody's on the payroll for something about her because there's no pay. There's no money. There's no money. I don't begrudge. Katie and Ariana and any of their partners the timeline of this restaurant. Like, I understand shit happens. This business is complicated. I can't, I can't begin to pretend to understand, like, all the permits and things. And I, I know, I have heard, I guess, from Vanderpump rules that WeHo is like notoriously slow and difficult about permits and things like that. I don't care. I'm not, I don't think it's shady that their restaurant isn't open yet.

I just can't pretend to care that much about it as a TV storyline. And that is honestly less about the specific issues with something about her and more of the fact that we've already had, what, four different bar and restaurant opening storylines on Vanderpump Rules. Back in the day, we saw pump open. Tom Tom was like a, two-year saga. Schwartz and Sandys went on forever. Like, I just don't think it's that interesting. You know, it's one thing to have it be brought up, to be talked about a little bit here and there, but we don't need multiple scenes and episode of process. And so I hope that it opens. I hope that everything's going well. I hope they make a lot of money. I just, I don't, my bandwidth for caring about anybody's restaurant is quite low.

So, I don't know. They do get a FaceTime call from Sheena. She's explaining, you know, that she has these complicated feelings about Tom and they did this meditation thing and that she felt like she saw genuine tears from him for the first time and that she is, you know, still working through her own feelings about him, but that basically she says she can't keep hating Tom for Ariana forever. And I feel like I've seen some mixed response to this. I think that there definitely is a tendency that I see among viewers of the show to sort of just like pile on Sheena sometimes. And I, she doesn't always help herself in that

regard. And it's the same thing with this, this photo that they took in Tahoe where she and Tom are next to each other. And she's like, I just, this girl was like, it's my birthday. Can I get a photo? And I just jumped in the photo. And he jumped in next to me. Like, I don't think that's that big of a deal. I get why it sucks to have people in your Twitter mentions being like, Sheena the

flip flopper. But also it's like just like mute the app. Nothing bad ever happened because somebody took a day off of Twitter. In fact, I recommend it. But I do think that Sheena has a point with the thing with Ariana that I think that this show and probably this friend group will function best if everybody kind of handles their relationships on an individual level. And certainly for the mechanics of the show, it works better if we don't have the entire cast just not speaking to someone. So I think that Tom, as I've said

over and over again, Tom isn't handling this amazing. And I think he has a a lot of work to do, and I think he could, you know, benefit from maybe my services. Actually, no, I don't want to work with Tom. But, like, you know, he could, he could stand to take some notes about how he's approaching things. But at the same time, I don't want everybody in the cast to not speak to him for a year until he, like, figures his shit out. And so I think that Lala and Sheena kind of having this conversation and sort of deciding that they need to take their own route through these issues. I think it's for the good of the show.

And we'll see kind of how it pans out. I don't love the whole like, Ariana needs to be taken down a notch. Like she needs to come back down to Earth. But I do think that she could be a little more understanding of Sheena's feelings. and I do think that there's room kind of for both things. And I think that Sheena is kind of in the eye of the storm in terms of trying to navigate these really complicated feelings and these people that have been in her life for a long time.

And I mean, Sandival, she talks about it all the time, was a dear, dear friend of hers. He has helped her out when she was down. They have really been there for each other. They've been through this whole experience of the show since the beginning. And I think that it's a little, for Katie and our, Ariana to kind of dismiss how bumpy this road is going to be for everyone as they sort of figure out what the new normal is, I feel like I have some grace for how Sheena's handling things. And Lala, too.

I think everybody's kind of arriving on their own timeline. And I mean, look, Sheena wanted to do Dancing with the Stars. And she's happy for Ariana, but she really wanted it. And You can drag her for that all you want, but that's fucking relatable. I'm sorry. Who among us has not seen a friend get a promotion that you wanted or seen a friend get a job that you want. Like, it happens. I don't know. Maybe like justice for Shishu, or at least like, patience for Shishu. Yeah, that's it. Patience for Shishu. That's my platform. Patience for Shishu 24. so much for listening. Don't forget to rate review and follow the show wherever you listen. We've got more coming tomorrow, later this next, I don't know. You guys know the schedule.

Whatever. Until next time, be cool. Don't be all like uncool. Mentioned at all is produced by Dylan Hafer, Sean Kilby, Jorge Morales Pico, and Rebecca Sousmaqat. Editing by Jorge Morales Pico. Social media by Dylan Hafer, guest booking by Dylan Hafer and Ali Friedlander. Be sure to follow at Bravo by Betches on Instagram and Twitter. Resort and Casino at San Manuel is California's number one entertainment destination for today's superstars. Catch the Jonas Brothers return to the Yamava Theatre stage on April 30th. The powerful vocals of Demi Lovato on May 17th and the signature Southern Country Rock of Eric Church on July 19th. Tickets on sale now at Yamavat Theatre.com.

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