Why is Everyone Hating on Lala Kent on Vanderpump Rules?

A Mini Weinstein with less power & no money?

Why is everyone hating on Lala Kent?

Randall Emmett and Lala

Randall Emmett and Lala Hello! Welcome to The Big Shot: a podcast about Vanderpump Rules and the Randall Emmett scandals.

I’m Lisa Tait, an Australian journalist who reports on true crime and true fraud. Plus, I am also a Vanderpump Rules super fan.

Well we have some news: Randall is supposedly engaged (again)! Or he isn’t? His ex Lala Kent said on WWHL he was engaged, but he later denied it.

A rep for Randall Emmett denied Kent’s claims, telling Us Weekly in a statement: “Randall is not in any way, shape or form engaged. Anyone who says otherwise is either lying, ill-informed or both.”

But the VPR star claimed “the closest people to” the producer “stay talking” so she “knows a lot of stuff.”

And now, just briefly, to the legal bit.

On this podcast, I will offer you the facts. Anything that is conjecture will be described clearly as such. It’s my obligation as a journalist to report this fairly and accurately. So I’m not making a comment on anyone’s guilt or innocence.

Plus today’s podcast is a lot to take in and includes references to sex abuse, so it’s not suitable for everyone.

And now to our story.

Randall Emmett and Lala

So who can forget when Randall Emmett’s former business partner, the superstar entertainer 50 Cent aka Fofty told the world Randall was “a Mini Weinstein with way less power and no money?”

In fact, Vulture reported this in 2021: “The thing around Hollywood that a lot of people say is it’s a surprise Randall hasn’t been killed by Russians or something, knowing the kind of money he deals with,” the producer who has worked with Emmett says. 

It continues:

Neither Emmett nor EFO films has been accused of any criminal violations in connection with the financing of his movies. Still, he says, “the number of people who share that line, like, ‘I’m shocked Randall is still alive,’ you just wouldn’t believe it.”

And as we know, the LA Times was reporting claims that Emmett allegedly offered acting roles in exchange for sexual favors, plus allegedly giving out financial settlements and NDAs to make issues go away. 

The allegations raise serious questions and are a heartbreaking picture of how some women are allegedly treated in this male-dominated industry.

As well as this, Lala claimed Randall “tackled” and pushed her to the ground when she confronted him about cheating on her in October 2021.

He denies this ever happened. So why is this allegation a key part of this picture?

Randall Emmett and Lala

Because the LA Times again reported Emmett had good reason to protect the iPhone. It was the keeper of his secrets — the tool he is accused of using to send lewd text messages to women, hunt for sexual prospects on Instagram and email his lawyer about wiring money to women in exchange for their silence.

Through interviews and reviewing previously confidential documents, The LA Times has learned that several women have accused Emmett of pursuing them in inappropriate ways — one alleged she was offered acting work in exchange for sex — even as Hollywood began to reconsider the way its powerful men treated women.

One woman, who declined to be named for fear of retribution, said that she was leaving a bar around midnight in 2014 when a Rolls-Royce pulled up beside her on Ventura Boulevard and a man she had never met rolled down the window. It was Emmett.

“I’m not a creep, I promise. I’m a movie producer, you can Google me — please Google me,” she said he implored, but Emmett denied the incident occurred.

I’m sorry Fofty! Who said that. 

Because things were again ramping up against the producer.

Randall Emmett and Lala

One woman alleges that the producer explicitly told her, “that to receive acting work from [him], she would have to perform xesual favors.” 

The Times cites a text exchange in which the woman asked Emmett if she’d won an acting role she’d auditioned for in one of his projects.

“Yes. one day of work and u need to fuckme hun,” Emmett responded, according to the letter.

He “adamantly denies” the allegations. 

Over the next three years, the female had minor roles in two more of Emmett’s films.

During this period, the woman alleges she gave Emmett massages and oral sex, allowed him to digitally penetrate her and stood nude in his office while he masturbated.

She complied with Emmett’s requests, the Times says, because she was “seeking to further her career” and did not want to “anger an important producer”

Whenever she rebuffed Emmett’s advances, he allegedly told her he would not give her the roles they had discussed.

The incidents caused her to feel a “deep sense of self-loathing and self-hatred” that led her to seek weekly therapy beginning in 2016.

Randall Emmett and Lala

The LA Times reported that On Jan 2022, Emmett was reportedly sent a legal settlement agreement that stipulated he would pay this woman $200,000 over the course of two years. 

A person familiar with the situation said Emmett printed, signed and scanned that agreement, although he denied doing so.

Just two months after finalizing that settlement, he also allegedly sent an unsolicited Instagram message to a 30-year-old woman in Las Vegas whose feed featured dozens of photos of herself and her boyfriend. 

This woman told The Times that Emmett — whom she’d never met — messaged her from his account using the social media platform’s “vanish mode” setting, which permanently deletes any text or pictures after they are seen by both users.

You learn something every day. I had no idea that vanish mode existed.

According to a declaration filed in his custody proceedings and reviewed by The Times, Emmett asked her to “f— on the dl” and “do heroin and meth,” among other things.

She did not respond and was so alarmed, she recounted, that she used the camera from her laptop to capture the Instagram messages on her phone.

The woman included screenshots of those images with her declaration.

But it’s not only the LA Times reporting on Randall. (Links in all these articles in the bio)

Randall Emmett and Lala

Neill Turitz from Below the Line wrote the following: “It’s sort of amazing to me that it took this long for Emmett to face the music, four-and-a-half years after #MeToo became a thing. This is a guy whose reputation was never exactly sterling to begin with, but like most of his movies, he managed to fly under the radar for years.”

Ouch. And there’s more. The reporter continues: “I’ve been on an Emmett set a couple of times, and I know several people who have worked with him — some only once, some more than that — and the thing that they all have in common is their severe and active distaste for the man. Sure, they weren’t above taking his money, but for most of them, that money soon became not nearly worth everything else that came along with it.”

And Emmett’s reputation as a hustler was well earned, considering how he built himself from relatively nothing into a Hollywood player. It’s the American Dream, really, and any time someone is able to pull that off, they should be celebrated for it.

On the other hand, when the person who realizes that Dream is the kind of person who has a sign on his office door reading “Assholes Get Shit Done,” and then does everything he can to live up to that philosophy, there’s considerably less celebrating to be done. 

It reminds me of another credo I’ve seen more than once — “Assholes succeed too,” which reassures us that the notion of nice guys coming out on top remains a fallacy. Emmett, by all accounts, is Exhibit A.

The Casting Couch Allegations 

Now back to when Lala Kent's world was rocked by the exposés of her now ex-fiance.

And the strain of all this is now evident as she opens up on Vanderpump Rules about how difficult it had been for her to process Emmett’s alleged actions. 

She tells a shocked LVP THIS about Randall’s new 23 yr old girlfriend:

Lala “He is being accused of running a casting couch…basically confirmed what Fifty Cent said: Mini Weinstein with less power & no money.”

Randall Emmett and Lala

However, as Lala told Katie and Ariana in the Vanderpump Rules premiere, the article “didn’t even include some of the most horrific things I’ve been told.”

For Lala, there’s no middle ground when it comes to Randall and her friends. 

“I don’t want to be around Schwartz

“He Played Pickleball with this thing.”

“I don’t want you in my circle. I got my Closest friends on Scheneas roof… because I was going into a custody battle.”

I understand this because some people inadvertently add to your emotional burden during a nasty break up. 

Life altering events like that tend to make you tighten your boundaries just to survive.

And Lala this is not about you. Schwartz is doing what people do: he thinks his pickleball stuff is more important than yours, and acts without thinking of the profound repercussions for you.

But Sandoval told Schwartz that he did not owe Lala any explanation for the pickleball.

I just like saying pickleball BTW. Sandoval also says, "you don't owe anything to her. F**k man." 

He went on to describe Lala and Randall's relationship in its early stages. Sandoval stated, "her being with Randall when they first met, it was like 'I'll suck your d**k for f**king range rover'." 

Schwartz further slammed Lala for not knowing Randall was not good for her. He called out the star for being "knocked up by a f**king dude like that."

Randall Emmett and Lala

Sounds a bit like victim blaming to me. You may disagree, so if you’d like to complain please email my assistant Tequila Katie & she’ll send you a text.

Sandoval, who clearly dislikes Lala, had his anger button elevated after listening to Schwartz's situation with her.

He stated in an interview, "it seems pretty insane that Lala didn't see this whole casting couch situation coming." He further slammed her for considering the whole situation to be "role-played." 

The show then plays a clip of Lala explaining how Randall was asking her to role-play and have oral sex with him.