So how did she end up doing a show that she often appears to not want to be a part of? An acting coach encouraged her to do it, asking bluntly, “Is Scorsese calling you?” So she signed up, shrugging off the objections of her by-then ex. But his criticisms stayed with her. “I was scared of him,” she says. “Even now I think I am a little bit.” Her body is tense and visibly so, as if she’s instinctively bracing for a barrage of insults. “I don’t even want to give it any life.”

When pushed, however, she steels her delicate features and talks about him. There were bedbugs, a bout of MRSA, and near-homelessness, all of which led to her becoming dependent on this controlling boyfriend who stepped in to help. “I know that on the show I’ve not necessarily had a whole lot of crazy and specific stuff that happened, but that’s because it all happened before,” she says. “There was no Vanderpump Rules when it happened to me.”

But now stuff is happening to her on the show, and it’s good stuff—the house, the book, and TomTom. While she isn’t a business partner in the West Hollywood bar Lisa Vanderpump and husband Ken Todd opened with Sandoval and Schwartz in 2018, she hasn’t ruled out the possibility of bar ownership down the line. “If you asked me this a year ago I would have said ‘That might not be my path,'” she says. “But now, seeing everything that [Tom and I are] building together, abso-fucking-lutely.”

Madix has been critical of Vanderpump’s at-times dismissive treatment of Sandoval and Schwartz, but she’s since softened. “Over the last year, I’ve connected on a new level with Lisa; she feels much more real to me now,” she says, adding that she thinks Vanderpump gets an unfair rap for favoring the men of the show over the women. “I never thought of that…I think that a lot of it is a little bit of a schtick. But I also think maybe she holds us to a higher standard. I don’t think she expects much of the men.”

As for her own relationships with her female cast-mates, she has, as promised, gotten to know everyone as individuals. “I really love Stassi the human,” she said, but when it comes to what she calls “Stassi the brand,” she loses patience for what she considers a queen-bee facade:”Stassi the brand is like a house of cards, she will say some shit to you that might really hurt your feelings, but the second you come back at her, it crumbles.”

Madix herself has said some things she now says are “cringey as fuck. So cringey.” Exhibit A: a scene in her first season where she declares, sneeringly, that she’s smarter, prettier and cooler than co-star and romantic rival Kristen Doute. She tells me that scene was actually filmed the night after the finale in which Doute famously confesses to sleeping with cast member Jax Taylor while she was still dating Sandoval. “We were fucking pissed at her. And I knew it would piss her off, which is why I said it,” she says.

But she doesn’t regret it. Madix assures me that’s not really who she is; it just made for good TV. “It’s our lives—but it’s also our jobs,” she says. As for what comes next, life- and job-wise, she’s focused on taking this huge opportunity and, in her words, “building and branching.” Those branches might include a digital show, another book, a podcast, and a product line of lifestyle goods à la Joanna Gaines. She also says, tantalizingly, “Maybe one day I’ll write a full blown tell-all book.”

For now, Ariana Madix knows her main gig is the show and the fame that goes along with it. She and Sandoval both feel a deep connection to their fans, whom they interact with constantly. “The craziest thing is being in places like this,” she gestures around Johnny Utah’s, “where you were broke and sneaking chicken wings behind the bar and being in such a different place in life.” Then, as if on cue—like a producer planted them there to drive the perfect scene home—a fan comes careening up to the table asking for a photo. They oblige. After all, they know full well, thanks to their success with the book and the bar, that indulging the fan experience is the trick to operating the bull of reality success.

Jolie Kerr is a writer whose work has been featured in The New York Times and The Inventory, among other outlets. Follow her on Twitter @joliekerr.

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