Downloaded from YTS.MX
[tense music]
Official YIFY movies site: YTS.MX
♪♪ ♪♪
HEATHER: Wow.
This is the juiciest time in reality show history.
[camera shutters clicking]
I have a returning guest,
star of Vanderpump Rules Lala Kent.
- As someone who's a fan of the show,
the only time I felt this deceived
is with you and your fiancé...
- Yeah. - And Randall.
Like, it's just devastating.
- And I think about that all the time.
How could I not have been smarter?
How is my daughter having to pay for my stupidity
and me keeping my blinders on
and not wanting to see red flags?
♪♪ ♪♪
Like, I beat myself up over that daily.
[dramatic music]
There's so many red flags,
but when you're in it,
unless you've been through it,
you can't comprehend it.
MEG: Randall Emmett's a Hollywood movie producer.
There were many times where I was talking to people,
and I'm like, "I can't believe what I'm hearing.
Is this real?"
MATTHEW: I mean, this is certainly
the underbelly of Hollywood.
It's not the part that you see on the postcards.
AMY: Randall continually worked with Bruce Willis.
Many crew members who said they were uncomfortable.
ALICIA: Bruce is staying there, completely confused
as to what he's being asked to do.
Randall slammed the script down, said,
"What the fuck?
Can't we just get this done?"
MATTHEW: I don't think Randall Emmett
would have drawn this much scrutiny
had he not become a reality TV character.
DAVID: Vanderpump Rules is about these young,
hot twenty-somethings, which are all working
in this restaurant, SUR.
One of the most interesting things about this whole case
was that 50 Cent got involved.
AMY: 50 Cent's, like, going for the jugular.
BRETT: My first interaction with Randall
was him in his underwear.
MARTIN: And upon opening the safe is a bag of cocaine.
He's putting me in a situation now where I could be arrested.
- There's so much breaking down of the soul and the mind.
ANNA: I take two steps in,
and I see him being totally naked.
MARTIN: When you hear the N-word being used
is where I draw the line.
LALA: You look at yourself and go,
"How the fuck did this happen to me?
And who even am I?"
MEG: We had a lot of people who, early on, said, oh, yeah,
they want to be part of this article.
And then they became very fearful.
LALA: Without Ocean, I would have
just moved on with my life.
But because I have her, I have to put up a big fight.
LISA: I do hope that he's held accountable,
that he gets what he deserves.
[camera shutter snapping]
♪♪ ♪♪
[birds chirping]
[muffled news chatter]
MEG: This was an important story to tell,
not only about Hollywood,
but just about this corner of the industry
that was often overlooked.
[dramatic music]
♪♪ ♪♪
My name is Meg James,
and I'm a business of entertainment reporter
for the Los Angeles Times.
I'm also an investigative reporter.
I always say if you live in Los Angeles,
what else would you want to cover
except for the business of Hollywood?
[soft music]
I've been doing this type of reporting
for more than 20 years now,
and over the course of my career,
I've covered everything from television ratings,
writers' strikes,
corrupt executives and politicians--
you name it.
The beat is never-ending and always surprising.
♪♪ ♪♪
In 2021, this story crossed my desk.
On its face, it wasn't that substantial.
This big Hollywood production firm was suing this producer
and alleging that they hadn't been paid for this work.
And even though it wasn't a lot of money in Hollywood terms,
it was a fascinating case because it showed so much
about what was going on under the surface.
And I wanted to research it more.
And it quickly became apparent to me that
there was a whole different element to this story.
This producer was on a reality TV show.
As soon as I started looking at that element,
I knew that I needed to bring my partner,
so I went to my editors, and I said,
"Look, there could be a really good story here,
but I know that I need to work with Amy Kaufman on it."
[bell dings] [typewriter keys clacking]
AMY: I was always obsessed with celebrities growing up.
Like, I had one of those walls where you could not see
an inch of paint because it was just, like,
poster, poster, poster, poster.
I think I kind of confused-- like, I wanted
to be an actress, but did I just think
that celebrities and Hollywood was fascinating?
So when I explored what I wanted to write,
I was like, well, I'm interested in this already.
And I would love to meet the characters
who make the city run and find out
how everything works behind the scenes.
And so it felt like just kind of a natural progression.
♪♪ ♪♪
In 2021, we got a tip in an email
from someone who said, "I have some information
I really think that you should look into,"
and that really opened the floodgates.
And we said, "Let's devote the time
and see if there's a story here."
[camera shutters clicking]
MEG: So this producer's name is Randall Emmett,
and he'd been in Hollywood about 25 years,
working largely on the margins of the business
in low-budget action pictures.
[indistinct chatter]
♪♪ ♪♪
AMY: So for the article,
we reviewed hundreds of documents.
There were court documents.
There were over, I think, 30 lawsuits.
We spoke to dozens of people who had worked with him,
encountered him, dated him.
He was being accused of mistreating
and abusing assistants.
He was being accused of owing millions of dollars
to investors.
It was one of those stories where initially,
you're like, "Okay, there's a lot here,"
but then you'd make a call and you'd, like, find out
something completely that blew your mind.
♪♪ ♪♪
- It wasn't that we were out to write
a negative Randall story,
but we wanted to be true to the people
whose stories we were telling.
We wanted to have a hard-hitting story,
a powerful story.
And we really wanted to illuminate
this dark corner in Hollywood.
[tense music]
One of the first things we started doing
was just looking at, who was Randall Emmett?
Where did he come from?
How did he become a big producer?
What was his origin story, really?
[upbeat jazzy music]
♪♪ ♪♪
AMY: Randall was raised in Florida,
and he went to a very well-respected
performing arts school.
[school bell rings]
FELIX: My name is Felix Pire.
Randall and I went to high school
in Miami, Florida,
at the New World School of the Arts,
and we graduated in 1989.
[camera shutter clicking]
High school with Randall was a lot of fun.
[chuckles]
He was always a super creative person.
And he had many things going on at the same time
that he was studying acting.
He always had, like, a video camera with him.
When we would go to parties, Randy was often
with the camera, shooting, or with a friend
who was shooting for him that he was directing.
[laughs]
That's another thing Randy would do.
I think he always kind of knew that he'd be looking at acting
and at all these things from, like, a macro point of view,
like from the point of view of the producer.
[soft music]
AMY: He has characterized himself
sort of, like, as an outsider or a nerd.
And he sort of has this, like, underdog persona to him.
That's the way I think he's presented himself
as a--as a youngster.
FELIX: He was always jokey, he was always big,
sometimes he was brash,
and sometimes he was an eye roll.
[laughs]
He could let things roll off his back.
He's got grit,
and grit is valued for a lot in Hollywood
because that just means tenacity.
It means perseverance.
It means somebody who,
even if somebody says something to you
that's insulting or might want to knock you down,
take it with a grain of salt, and you move forward.
♪♪ ♪♪
AMY: So after high school, Randall moves to New York,
and he ends up at the School of Visual Arts,
where he starts doing behind-the-scenes filmmaking.
MEG: I think he saw that the magic
was made behind the camera,
and it was really a fascinating job
to be the person who was able to pull everything together.
[tense music]
AMY: So he moves to LA and then connects
with a very distant cousin of his
who happens to be a very big power broker in Hollywood,
Jerry Bruckheimer.
MEG: Having a relative that could kind of, like,
get you in the door is always a plus.
He was an intern there,
and then when he was about 24 or 25,
he became Mark Wahlberg's assistant,
and that really defined Randall's origin story.
[indistinct chatter] [camera shutters clicking]
So Entourage was a hugely successful series on HBO
that was loosely based on Mark Wahlberg's life
as an up-and-coming star in Hollywood.
[rock music]
SINGER: ♪♪ Oh, yeah ♪♪
♪♪ Oh, yeah, yeah ♪♪
♪♪ ♪♪
- Randall liked to say that he was the inspiration
for part of the character Turtle,
who was played by Jerry Ferrara.
So Turtle is kind of like the driver,
the guy who, like, helps you get weed if you need it,
like, helps you set up a party.
- All I'm saying, Vince, is we should have a house rule.
Either we all get laid, or nobody gets laid.
That way, you know you'll always have
a ride home for your girl.
- The culture that you saw
reflected on shows like Entourage
sort of emphasize the dream in Hollywood being
dudes getting with really hot women,
going out clubbing, going on vacation
in exotic locations where they're on yachts
surrounded by, like, a bevy of beauties.
And Randall, by all accounts,
really aspired to live that life.
Unfortunately, young people coming to Hollywood
were taught, like, "Listen.
"The first few years are gonna be brutal.
You're not gonna be treated well.
You're barely gonna be paid.
You just gotta take it,
because if you can make it through this,
then there's a big shiny reward on the other side
where you get to be
the rich and famous successful one
who probably treats your assistant like crap.
[camera shutter clicking]
Even though you may not be treated excellently
when you're working for a celebrity,
you also are exposed to some of the perks of that lifestyle--
getting to fly in first class or go to cool film festivals,
interact with actors who are friends with your boss--
and I think those are some of the things
that Randall's probably exposed to early on,
and maybe got a taste of and wanted more of.
[camera shutter clicking]
♪♪ ♪♪
MATTHEW: My name is Matthew Belloni.
I'm a founding partner of Puck, a digital media site,
and I'm the former editor of The Hollywood Reporter.
[bell dings]
Hollywood has always been
a business about hustling,
about getting whatever you want by any means necessary.
Randall Emmett definitely falls into the hustler category.
He really arrived and said, "This is what I want to do,
"and I'm going to start at the bottom,
and I'm gonna make it to the top."
[camera shutter clicking]
MEG: After his stint with Mark Wahlberg,
it wasn't but a couple years later that he found
George Furla, who was not a player in Hollywood,
but a very smart and rich man who had a lot of money.
And he really had a keen financial sense.
[upbeat music]
♪♪ ♪♪
So it was a perfect pairing of the guy
who was very happy to be in the background
and, you know, just make sure the numbers worked,
and Randall, who really was a larger-than-life presence
who wanted to be the front man.
MATTHEW: The most important partnership of his career
is the partnership with Furla,
because that enabled the company
to get off the ground
and for him to really start doing things on his own.
- All the pieces seemed to be falling in place
for Randall Emmett.
He was an established producer.
He was making hits.
But as we dug into the investigation,
the twists and turns really started coming,
and we really weren't expecting what we found.
[tense music]
MEG: Randall Emmett and George Furla
together form their production company,
Emmett/Furla Films.
Emmett/Furla Films really took this business model
of action stars, low-budget films
that would play really well overseas.
MATTHEW: And what Randall Emmett's business
was about was volume.
He was not trying to win the Palme d'Or at Cannes.
He was not trying to win Oscars.
His business was not set up to win awards.
It was to make money.
AMY: He's really made his name on what has come to be known
as "geezer teasers," which means that basically,
he finds an action star who used to be popular
a few decades ago, like Steven Seagal
or John Travolta
or Bruce Willis.
MATTHEW: The reason you do that is because
so many of these films are bought and sold
based on what the poster looks like.
Mercenary for Justice.
Survive the Game.
Hot Seat. Hard Kill.
Fortress. That's a Bruce Willis movie.
The tagline is, "This prison has no bars."
The titles are always funny.
No, it does not make me want
to see one of these films.
MEG: As we got into the reporting
of this investigation,
we had a lot of internal emails and contracts.
And really, you could see why, in black and white,
somebody wanted to be in one of Randall's films.
Bruce Willis, according to a draft
of a legal agreement that we saw,
was offered $2 million for one day's work.
An email between Randall
and Sylvester Stallone's people showed
that the actor was offered about $8 million
for just a few days of work.
Robert De Niro was offered the largest payday,
$11 million for two weeks' work,
according to an unsigned deal memo.
- You know, think about it.
If you were a star like Bruce Willis
or Arnold Schwarzenegger,
who in the heyday of their career
were making $20 million a movie,
and now no big studio is paying them
that amount of money.
A guy like Randall Emmett comes along,
and he can at least wave a couple of million dollars
in these guys' faces.
I mean, this is certainly the underbelly of Hollywood.
It's not the part that you see on the postcards.
♪♪ ♪♪
- So around this time, reality television shows
are really hitting big,
and Randall decided that he was gonna be
the subject of a reality show himself.
He named it The Mogul.
[dramatic music]
♪♪ ♪♪
- It was really illuminating
because it showed how Randall saw himself.
He was barking orders at his assistant.
- Bro, you gave me a fucking heart attack today, bro.
Already have a heart attack that I'm flying.
Without somebody that's efficient,
that keeps your life moving on a day-to-day basis,
everything comes crumbling down.
Everything.
You have my wallet?
Call up Greg and tell him that you're fucking retarded.
What do you think I was talking about?
Michael, I want you to start working on the jets right now.
That's what you need to work on,
jets and the hotel for Santa Barbara.
Let's go.
You know, the honeymoon period's over now.
- I don't believe it sold.
There was never-- there was never a TV show made
about Randall, The Mogul.
But you could see the drive and the determination,
and just how Randall was very smart in knowing
what it would take to market himself
as a big shot in Hollywood.
The truth is Randall was finding success.
His movies weren't everybody's cup of tea,
but if you added them all up,
they were grossing hundreds of millions of dollars.
MATTHEW: When you look at Emmett/Furla
and you look at how active they were,
this was clearly a business
that was working for a long time.
♪♪ ♪♪
And eventually, the better projects
started coming to them.
[phone ringing]
♪♪ ♪♪
MEG: Around this time, Randall gets a call
from one of the most powerful, if not the most powerful,
agent in Hollywood, who suggests
that Randall work with Martin Scorsese.
The project was called Silence.
MATTHEW: Not a lot of people wanted to make Silence,
which was a very niche film.
That gave an opportunity for someone like Randall Emmett
to come in and say, "I will help get your movie made."
What Silence did for Randall Emmett was
it gave him a relationship with Martin Scorsese,
one of the most prolific and powerful filmmakers
in Hollywood.
- Martin Scorsese directed
some of the most iconic films
in the history of America's cinema:
Taxi Driver,
Raging Bull,
and Goodfellas.
And for Randall, someone who came from,
you know, very humble beginnings,
the thought of working with one of the greatest filmmakers
of all time was just so incredible.
I think that during that period,
he had a wonderful time.
I mean, Rolls-Royces, a house on Mulholland.
He was in demand.
And if you're Randall Emmett,
you're making it in Hollywood in a way
that this sort of geeky kid from Miami
never thought he could achieve.
[dramatic music]
♪♪ ♪♪
BRETT: My name is Brett Pearson.
I was a personal assistant for Randall Emmett.
I grew up in a town called Normal, Illinois.
It's about two hours south of Chicago.
My backyard was a cornfield.
I've always loved movies.
It was the one thing me and my father had in common
was that we'd go to movies together.
I had to watch all the Godfathers
and all the Rockys and Rambos--
you know, these late '80s, early '90s action movies.
That's really where we connected.
My dad unfortunately had a fall in 2013,
and he actually suffered
a--a subarachnoid brain hemorrhage.
And within that time too,
my mom got diagnosed with cancer.
The last time I saw my mom alive,
she told me that I could be whatever I wanted to be,
and not to let anybody tell me any different.
I decided to move to LA,
and my aspiration was to be a screenwriter.
I started as an intern in April of 2017 at EFO.
And then by May, I was the personal assistant.
My first day, I was immediately on
to filling up the Rolls-Royce.
To that point, I had not met Randall.
And later that day,
he came in, back from Coachella.
And my first interaction with Randall
was him in his underwear.
♪♪ ♪♪
Came, flew back from Palm Springs
and immediately needed a IV and clothes.
[upbeat music]
♪♪ ♪♪
[music winds down]
So I went and grabbed clothes out of his car,
and I believe somebody from an IV doctor came,
helped him out with his long weekend.
You had to have a certain mentality
and a certain bravado
and a certain level of arrogance to...
be there.
It was like a fucking Animal House
for a production company in LA.
[lively music]
The Rolls-Royces, the jets.
Like, yeah, it was big leagues.
♪♪ ♪♪
I didn't know anything else about Hollywood.
I thought that that--
I swear to God,
I thought that that life was what I wanted.
♪♪ ♪♪
Because I was really digging that lifestyle at EFO
and really digging that whole bravado.
♪♪ ♪♪
And it was the dumbest mistake,
the dumbest decision I could have made.
[tense music]
♪♪ ♪♪
BRETT: Yeah, I probably was about 190 pounds
when I went out there,
and by the time I got back in August of 2018,
I was down to about 130 pounds.
The stress of everything, the nonstop lifestyle--
I mean, Randall had to get seven hours of sleep a night,
you know?
And for me, I was lucky
if I could get three hours of sleep.
Randall, you know, would fight about anything.
It was like a fucking powder keg went off.
♪♪ ♪♪
It was insane.
Like, the intensity and the anxiety
that he brings to everyone is palpable.
I don't think I was calm or, like,
not riddled with anxiety at any point
once I met Randall Emmett.
[tense music]
MEG: By the late 2000s,
Randall was an established producer,
and he met his wife, Ambyr Childers,
who was an aspiring actress.
She was in her late teens at the time.
AMY: They got married in 2009,
and a year later, they already had their first daughter
and would later welcome a second.
Ambyr would go on to work on
some really well-known projects.
She was on the first season of You,
the Netflix now hit show.
- I'm Candace.
- Oh.
Hey, I'm Joe.
- Thanks for your help, Joe.
MEG: Their marriage fell apart, though,
when Randall met Lala Kent.
- Lala Kent is a reality star.
She's on the Bravo show Vanderpump Rules.
[indistinct shouting] [camera shutters clicking]
[upbeat music]
DAVID: I'm David Yontef, and I am the host
of the Behind the Velvet Rope podcast,
which is a pop culture, reality TV,
and everything in between podcast.
I have interviewed Lala several times for my podcast.
Vanderpump Rules spun off
of The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills.
It started as a show about SUR,
one of Lisa Vanderpump's restaurants.
It's about these young, hot twenty-somethings,
which are all working in this restaurant.
Talk about gold.
- You have this group of young people
that are struggling to grow up,
but it was also kind of interconnected.
This one had lived with this one.
This one used to date that one.
- They all had--yeah.
- And I think this, the stakes are so much higher
because people are so invested in their lives.
- And it really, season after season after season--
there was no sophomore slump.
The third year was better, the fourth year.
In its heyday, it was by far the best show
that has ever existed on Bravo TV.
You can quote me on that.
And then all of a sudden, you know, several seasons in,
they introduced this new cast member, Lala Kent,
and you're like, who is this?
She works at the host desk, and you know,
just probably the most gorgeous thing
that's ever been on the damn show.
LISA: My name's Lisa Burningham.
I'm Lala Kent's mother.
Her given name is Lauren Elise Burningham,
but everybody calls her Lala.
[soft music]
EASTON: She got the nickname Lala--
I want to say from me.
I'll take credit on it.
Lauren is my sister.
And when I was a little tyke, I couldn't say Lauren,
so I would say Lala.
And any time I needed her, just, "Lala."
So that's where she got her nickname.
[bell ringing]
LISA: She was born and raised in Salt Lake City, Utah.
She loved theater.
She loved singing, dancing, violin, baseball,
basketball--you name it.
Lala was a big performer.
She, from the get-go, as soon as she could talk,
she was our little performer.
- You could tell that she was gonna be something.
LISA: As a child, she wrote in her little autobiography
in grade school that she wanted to be famous
and she wanted to live in LA
and she wanted to live in the Hollywood Hills.
And so she did.
EASTON: Well, she was just working at SUR.
LISA: They offered her a contract
to work and also be filmed.
And so, of course, she took that opportunity.
DAVID: The minute she appeared on camera, I knew.
I knew she was gonna be a superstar for reality TV.
- Without Vanderpump Rules, you know,
these opportunities wouldn't have been presented to me,
and I wouldn't have been able to, you know,
take the opportunities by the balls
and do something great.
- Lauren handled being famous so quickly like a champ.
I mean, this has been her dream since she was,
you know, yea high.
So she's living her dream.
- It was actually on the job that she met Randall.
LISA: He came in for a Christmas party,
and he sent his assistant over to talk to her
and told her that he was interested in having her
in a movie and wanted to meet with her agent,
and that's how they first met.
HEATHER: My name is Heather McDonald.
I'm best known right now for my podcast Juicy Scoop.
You know, I've interviewed a lot of reality stars
throughout my years of doing what I do.
Lala, she's been on my show many, many times.
Throughout the years, we became good friends.
I first got to know Lala
because I started watching Vanderpump,
and I really loved her personality,
and I wanted to interview someone from the show.
So I reached out,
and she came on.
And at that time,
her storyline was pretty juicy.
The girls are being really mean to her.
- Are they saying stuff about her?
KATIE: Yeah, that Lala's just like, "Oh, my God.
"So this guy, his wife found a video
of us having sex on his phone."
- You guys are [bleep] out of your minds.
- And this was my theory, like, from the get-go
with you is I just don't-- I don't trust you.
- They didn't know if she was going on jets and yachts
and all this other stuff because she was, like,
you know, a sugar baby.
What was going on?
You see her on Vanderpump Rules,
and she's like, "Let 'em hit it on the first date."
The next day, he sends her a Range Rover.
- The first night we banged, I got a car the next day.
He was like, "Do you want a Range Rover?"
I was like, "Yeah."
- Is your vagina just, like, made of sparkles?
- The first time I met Randall was at dinner,
and it was in Salt Lake City.
And it was great.
She loved his energy.
She loved the way that he loved her.
I feel like just all of that and everything
that he was doing for her was amazing.
LISA: In the early days, I think what she liked
about Randall is that he made her feel safe.
I remember her telling me that she had taken off
all her makeup and he told her how beautiful she was.
And I think that made her feel secure
and comfortable with him.
And it just went from there.
[thunder rumbling]
In 2018, my husband had a stroke.
[somber music]
And six weeks later, he passed away in his sleep.
♪♪ ♪♪
It was devastating.
And Randall just kind of came and picked up all the pieces.
♪♪ ♪♪
EASTON: Randall, he stepped up to the plate.
And he really did do a lot.
And he made it easier for us to kind of
mourn the loss of my father.
LISA: I did become close to Randall.
I felt like we had a good relationship.
DAVID: Look, Lala believed
this was really it for her.
I mean, she defended the relationship so much.
- You know, there's always gonna be people
that like to sling that, you know,
the gold digger word around, which is totally fine.
I just like to say that
you're just upset about your own world.
But you know, I'm not like that.
And Randall's my--my person.
- I am here with Lala and Randall,
boyfriend to the stars.
- [chuckles]
HEATHER: Um...wow.
How your life has improved
since you met Lala, really, Randall?
- I mean, the fame, the fans.
- [speaking indistinctly]
RANDALL: I'm joking.
No, my life has improved because I have--
I have a best friend, you know?
And--and honestly, we--we--
I--I really love having somebody that's, like,
my ride or die, best friend, soul mate.
[indistinct chatter]
- By 2018, Randall and Lala become engaged,
and he becomes attached to what becomes
the biggest film of his career,
Martin Scorsese's The Irishman.
- Did you ever hit anybody?
- On a job? - Yeah.
♪♪ ♪♪
- I don't think so.
- All right, then we don't have nothing
to worry about.
MEG: I think for Randall, it was just being
in that close of proximity
to work with, you know, such an incredible talent
was a huge benefit to him and fed his ego too,
because now suddenly, on his emails,
he would sign them, "a producer of The Irishman."
And The Irishman was very well-received.
There was a premiere in London.
There was another one in France.
And Randall went to those.
And Netflix flew him and Lala.
There was the--an opening in New York City.
So it was, like, really heady days,
and he was finally there.
- Randall was publicly at a apex of his career.
He was a producer on a film that was nominated
for Best Picture at the Oscars.
- It seemed like by that point, you know,
everything was going great for Randall,
because his career is continuing on the upswing.
But really, behind the scenes,
things were already starting to fall apart.
[tense music]
♪♪ ♪♪
AMY: By 2019, we were starting to see the cracks
in Randall's growing empire.
So it appeared that he was not making good
on payments to investors.
And the first sign of trouble came from none other
than 50 Cent.
DAVID: One of the most interesting things
about this whole case, and funniest,
was that 50 Cent got involved.
We all know 50 Cent, Curtis Jackson.
He's, you know, a great actor, one of the most famous rappers.
AMY: When he met Randall, he was just starting out
in his acting endeavors.
And he ended up being in a ton of movies
that Randall produced.
And he and Randall actually had a film production company
together called Cheetah Vision.
So in 2019, 50 Cent suddenly goes on Instagram
and says, "Randall, you owe me $1 million."
[dramatic music]
DAVID: Then Randall starts texting him,
and 50 Cent posts the texts.
You know, "I'm sorry again.
"I really am.
I said I'm sorry, 'fofty.'"
- Presumably, what he meant to say was,
"I'm really sorry, fifty," but he wrote "fofty,"
and for whatever reason,
that just struck the zeitgeist as hilarious.
It became #foftygate.
50 Cent started sort of jokingly
referring to himself as Fofty.
- Then 50 Cent posts, "Money by Monday, Randall,"
and, "Monday is coming."
Then Randall sent him a picture of himself in the hospital.
50 Cent posts the picture and said,
"You're not gonna die before Monday, Randall.
"You made this fucking mess.
"When the money hits the accounts,
"everything comes down.
"Okay, I just got the wire, asshole.
Back to my regular scheduled program."
And then they were talking about it,
and even on Watch What Happens Live.
- Do you regret taking your beef with Randall
to social media?
- No.
I got me paid right away.
He paid right away.
- I think 50 Cent is badass.
[soft music]
♪♪ ♪♪
MEG: One of the more fascinating stories
that we uncovered was the making of a TV show
that never was.
There was a show that Randall was going to put together
starring Arnold Schwarzenegger called Pump.
TERESA: One of my representatives said it best.
She said, "Randall Emmett is sketch at best."
My name is Teresa Huang, and I am
a one-hour drama television writer.
Before I started working on Pump,
I heard lots of stories about Randall Emmett.
I was encouraged not to take the job by various people.
And opportunities to staff on a television show
as a writer are hard to come by.
[upbeat music]
Pump was gonna be a very cool television show.
It was going to be a love letter to Venice Beach
in the 1970s, the birth of bodybuilding in California
and in the world, really, because Venice Beach
was the center of all of that.
And Arnold Schwarzenegger played
a large role in that time.
And we were so excited to tell this story
about a bunch of dreamers.
I was under the impression that Arnold was already
signed on as an executive producer,
and also play a role in the show.
I started work right after Labor Day
in September of 2019.
It was a very small writer's room.
The first step in any new series
is to break the whole season, you know,
just give a loose overview of where we're going.
And the first step was to present that season
to Randall and George Furla
and all the people at EFO.
It was going to be a lunchtime pitch,
so he gave us his orders
for all the people who were coming,
and his team arrived,
and the lunch arrived,
and he had not ordered lunch
for the two interns that he brought with him.
I remember seeing these two interns.
I just remember the look on their faces,
especially the woman.
She just looked terrified.
And no one from the company acknowledged either of them
the entire day.
And I thought,
"Yeah, I know who this guy is."
But I concentrated on contributing to this pitch
and sharing the 10 episodes we were making.
And Randall left very happy.
And at the end of the pitch,
he said something sort of in passing.
He said, "This is great.
Now we can get Arnold to sign on."
There was no deal in place with Arnold Schwarzenegger.
There was no contract signed.
And in order to get that contract signed,
we then had to pitch Arnold himself.
So that's what we did next.
We went to Arnold's office and pitched to him.
And he loved it too.
He loved where the show was going.
He was so excited and immediately
started sharing more stories
that we could put into the show.
So we left that pitch feeling very excited.
So then I saw in the trades
that Arnold Schwarzenegger was switching agencies,
that he was leaving CAA and going to UTA.
I remember forwarding it to everyone on the staff
and asking, "What does this mean for our show?"
Because in the back of my mind, I think I knew what it meant.
I think I knew that we were not gonna make this show
because Arnold had not signed on any dotted line
assuring his attachment to the project.
And then I heard that the word had come down from Randall
that he was not going to pay out the rest of our contracts
and that we were just out of luck.
[tense music]
Myself and another writer almost immediately
started to panic because we knew that without this income
logged in pension and health,
we would lose our health insurance.
And thinking about that now, going into the pandemic,
that was-- that was really scary.
And we just started what felt like
two years of legal proceedings trying to get this payment.
We were paired with a wonderful lawyer at the WGA.
She went to war for us.
- The Writers Guild is a labor union
that represents over 10,000 film and television writers.
On behalf of its members, the Writers Guild negotiates
what we call a collective bargaining agreement
with the studios that employ the writers.
If companies don't comply with those minimum terms
and conditions, we can bring claims in arbitration.
We brought an arbitration claim.
The arbitrator ruled entirely in the WGA's favor
and ordered EFO to pay all the outstanding compensation
and pension and health contributions owed,
close to $500,000.
EFO refused to pay any portion of that arbitration award.
- So we decided maybe the best we could get
was a "do not work" order,
which is a notice sent to the membership
warning writers not to work for EFO as an employer.
LEILA: It's a big deal.
So the bad acts have to rise
to a particularly egregious level for us to do that.
TERESA: So the "do not work" order went out,
and we did hear that they were contacted by EFO
and by Randall Emmett,
and they wanted this "do not work" order rescinded.
He said, "Well, what if I do a small payment now?
"You rescind the 'do not work' order,
and then I'll get you the rest of the money."
And we talked amongst ourselves,
and we knew that that "do not work" order
was our only piece of leverage.
So we said no.
And as far as I know, it's still in place.
- Randall Emmett continued to refuse to pay.
As of today's date, that judgment amounts
to over $630,000 that are owed to our four members.
Over the course of our enforcement actions,
I was struck by the demonstrations
on his Instagram page
of conspicuous consumption,
wealth, a life of real luxury.
That juxtaposed with
his cavalier refusal
to honor his obligations to our writers.
BRETT: Randall's spending habits...
[cash registers dinging]
You paid so much just to have status.
[laughter]
I think Lala--
I think she was a little bit overwhelmed
with everything that was happening.
They would get into a fight, and the next day,
I would have to go spend, like, $600, $700 on roses
to send to her house.
One day, I did the math
just of how much his rent was,
his leases were, his insurance was.
That's not even with the gambling.
That's not even with paying for jets.
That's not even paying for gas.
Gas to fill up that Rolls-Royce
back then was, like, $130.
I don't even want to know how much it is now.
Literally, he spent money on everything.
♪♪ ♪♪
MEG: 2019 was a roller coaster year for Randall Emmett.
His career really seemed to be taking off.
He also made a fateful decision
to go on camera on Vanderpump Rules.
- I'm just trying to break even at this point.
- Randall, you keep this up, I'm not gonna need
that home equity loan.
- Oh, yeah! - Oh, [bleep].
[bell dinging]
- I don't want another boys night for a long time.
- As the seasons went on, he had a much bigger role.
I mean, you kind of just saw him more and more.
- He was always, like, by Lala's side at parties,
um, and there to listen when there was drama going on.
HEATHER: He loved being on Vanderpump Rules.
And they featured him a lot
because four of the cast members
were no longer returning.
And so Lala and Randall were a big part of it.
And so they made Randall a big part of it too.
- You know what, babe?
You should just move in already.
- I agree.
I just want to get the master bedroom moved--
- Finished.
- And I think Randall may have
drank the Kool-Aid a little bit then,
and really, you know, loved it and had fun.
- Oh. - You had me for a second too.
And I was nervous.
Thank you for participating
in the first annual Kent/Emmett Palm Springs Invitational.
[all cheering]
[indistinct chatter]
PHOTOGRAPHER: Lala and Randall!
[indistinct shouting]
DAVID: You know, I have to think,
once you put yourself in front of the camera,
it's a whole different thing.
I literally would not know the name Randall Emmett
if I didn't see him on Vanderpump Rules.
You have to wonder,
if he didn't put himself out there
and he wasn't on Vanderpump Rules,
he might still be living a different life.
♪♪ ♪♪
[soft music]
AMY: One thing that kept coming up
in our reporting about Randall
was that he continually worked with Bruce Willis.
- Movie stars don't get more iconic than Bruce Willis.
When you hear his name, you think of Pulp Fiction,
The Sixth Sense, Armageddon,
and the movie he's most synonymous with, Die Hard.
- Yippee-ki-yay, motherfucker.
- People know Bruce Willis.
People love Bruce Willis.
- And what we found was many crew members
who said that they were uncomfortable
working with Bruce,
not because Bruce was doing anything wrong,
but because they felt like Bruce potentially
wasn't aware of the environment
that he was put in, that sometimes
he literally was asking, "Where am I?
Why am I here?"
[tense music]
ALICIA: I'm Alicia Haverland,
and I was one of the prop masters
on Randall Emmett's film
Midnight in the Switchgrass.
So before we even get onto set,
you start to realize
all the corners that are being cut.
Crew members are roomed together.
We have line producers sleeping
on a couch in a rec center.
You have writers sleeping three to a room.
And then you'd come on set,
and the-- what I like to call the uppers,
Randall and his immediate team--
they're sleeping in a hotel down the road.
So they're coming in fresh.
They're talking about dinners.
You know, we're barely getting reasonable food.
Randall very quickly morphed
into being loud and aggressive.
He was a screamer.
And then as we went along,
he was getting more and more hostile.
And he started taking it out on crew members.
And that was rough.
I even said to him one day-- I'm like,
"You know, it's funny, when you walk onto a set,
everyone acts like you've got a live grenade."
And he's like, "I love it."
It just came off as someone
who was extremely self-absorbed,
who only cared about them and did not care about
anything that's going on around him.
I have never met a director in my entire career that
in the middle of a take, will get up, get on the phone,
and walk away.
♪♪ ♪♪
It's disrespectful at all angles.
And you just kind of watch it,
and you become numb to it.
And then we got Bruce for the last week of filming.
We'd been kind of prepped ahead of time
by our line producer, who had mentioned
that Bruce struggles with his lines.
[soft music]
He has a gentleman who works with him,
his assistant, who has an earwig
that Bruce wears at all times,
and he feeds Bruce his lines.
The first day we had Bruce, he was the sweetest,
most soft-spoken man.
Introduced himself to me.
He introduced himself to my crew,
thanked us for giving him his props,
never complained-- was just lovely.
So in the beginning of the day,
Bruce would get through his lines pretty quickly.
The assistant would be speaking into a microphone.
And he would be really good about parroting the lines.
As the day progressed,
you could tell that he was getting tired,
and he would start to clip the lines.
But I started to realize it wasn't clipping.
I started to realize that what he was doing
was actually forgetting what was being said to him.
♪♪ ♪♪
Day two, there was a scene that we did in a diner
where we're pouring cups of coffee,
and he is struggling through his lines.
I had made the decision once we realized what was going on
that I needed to be there.
So I go over to repour the coffee.
We're probably doing take number 7 or 8.
And he puts his hand over the coffee,
looks me dead in the eye, and goes,
"Oh, no, ma'am. I don't want any more."
And I said, "Bruce, I've gotta refill the glass,
you know, for the scene," and he goes,
"Did I order more coffee?"
He thought I was a waitress.
He thought we were in a diner.
And Randall boils.
You can feel it off Randall when he's mad.
He just wants to get this movie.
He said it many, many times.
He just wants to get through the fucking lines.
So for the rest of that evening,
I was continuing to be the waitress.
He would say no, he doesn't want coffee.
I'd say, "No, sir. You asked for it."
And then he would take his hand away
and let me pour the coffee.
I've got this gentleman who is struggling,
in my opinion.
And it was a very simple scene. It was really simple.
- Man, so was this the nicest place
you could find for a going-away meal?
- There you go. How about you, hon?
- Thank you. - I'm good, thank you.
[tense music]
- Looks like you're feeling better.
- Not as good as you.
You look like a giddy fucking schoolgirl.
- [chuckles]
ALICIA: I think that he just woke up in a diner,
and he thought I was his waitress,
and that was heartbreaking.
[somber music]
So we were doing a scene.
Bruce Willis kicking in the door,
a scene people have shot a million times with him.
All I'm hearing is, "Bruce is having a hard time
"kicking in the door.
"Bruce is having a hard time kicking in the door.
He doesn't really understand what he's doing."
And I am standing, I don't know,
10 feet from Randall,
and he is running his hands through his hair,
and he's--you can tell he's just freaking out.
And he gets up, and he slams the script down,
said, "What the fuck?
Can't we just get this done?"
And I am stick straight,
as small as I can make myself against this wall.
Bruce is standing there completely confused
as to what he's being asked to do.
The stunt guys and I are looking at each other.
Everyone is just real quiet.
And Randall turns around and walks away,
and Bruce looks at--
I believe at our DP at the time and goes,
"Did I do something wrong?"
And we're all just like, "No, of course not."
And that's Bruce Willis.
Die Hard.
That's John McClane.
We should have said something.
- Oh, yeah. I feel immensely guilty.
- What was really striking to me
the day that Bruce's family announced
that he was retiring,
they disclosed his aphasia diagnosis.
That day, there was a palpable sense of relief
from crew members.
They wanted to remember Bruce
as the phenomenal actor that he was.
And they really were concerned and distressed
that his--that he was struggling so on set.
And they just really wanted the best for Bruce.
ALICIA: It's nice to know that he's retired.
It's nice to know that he's being cared for
and that he's finally getting the rest
he absolutely deserves.
But I really wish it had happened earlier.
I really wish that Midnight hadn't happened.
It didn't need to happen.
I don't know, as a human being,
that you can watch that struggle
and be okay with what you're doing.
♪♪ ♪♪
[somber music]
♪♪ ♪♪
MEG: As we got into the reporting
of this investigation,
we started calling numerous people
that used to work for Randall Emmett,
and pretty quickly, it became clear
that some of these former assistants had
really outrageous, and in some cases, sad stories
to tell about their time in Hollywood.
♪♪ ♪♪
MARTIN: My name is Martin G'blae,
I am 30 years old,
and I'm originally from Pawtucket, Rhode Island.
So growing up, my dad had this video camera.
And me and him would just play around and shoot stuff.
And then as I grew on,
I would operate this VH camcorder camera myself.
And all the neighborhood kids would circulate
and populate, like, outside our house.
And we would conjure up scenarios
and go into shooting things.
I went to the University of Rhode Island,
where I got into visual communications.
My senior year of college,
one of my good friends was living out in LA,
and he said, "Martin, come out to LA."
So packed my bags,
didn't even tell my mom,
hop on a plane and go to LA.
And just started my life there.
[soft music]
There was a position open at EFO
for an executive assistant.
I went in for the interview on a Tuesday,
got told I got the job Wednesday,
and had to be in Thursday to start.
He trained me for two days... [laughing] And left.
And here I am, alone on the desk.
I felt like I was wearing many hats.
Some days, you feel like the chef.
Some days, you feel like the nanny.
Some days, you feel like the dog walker.
Some days, you feel like the actual assistant
that I applied to be.
One of the biggest obstacles working this job
was the amount of money I had to pay out of pocket.
[tense music]
♪♪ ♪♪
BRETT: I got paid $700 a week
to be on call 24 hours a day.
Despite Randall paying me $700 a week,
he still expected me to pay for everything that he needed:
uh, groceries,
paying for his friends to stay at his--the hotels,
and flights.
I mean, all my credit cards,
by the time I left Los Angeles,
were fucking maxed out,
and the interest just started piling up and piling up.
And the last time I looked, I'll still have
another 12 years if I don't pay more
than just the minimum payment on interest.
♪♪ ♪♪
MARTIN: Prior to COVID hitting,
Randall would be spending most of his time
in Puerto Rico filming
the slate of movies that he had.
I get a call that poker night is coming up,
that he needs his poker table shipped to Puerto Rico.
And he needs it there for tomorrow.
So the only way you would get something like that,
um, to Puerto Rico in 24 hours
is by overnight freighting it.
Keep in mind, I was provided no card to put it on.
So the initial toll was, like, $1,500.
I paid for it out of pocket,
but then someone had to be there
to unload the table and set it up.
So now, I realized that I have to drop what I'm doing,
hop on a plane.
Then I realized, oh,
I also have to pay for my plane ticket.
And they did not offer me anywhere to stay.
So now I need to find an Airbnb
and pay for that Airbnb myself.
I am now spending $1,500
plus the $400 ticket
and the $280/night Airbnb stay.
In the moment, you feel like you have no other choice.
It's either finance this person's extravagant life
or run the risk of being fired.
♪♪ ♪♪
The poker table ends up coming.
I set it up.
Randall pulls me aside and tells me
he forgot something in his safe,
he really needs it,
and if I can go back and retrieve it.
Me and another assistant make the 35-minute drive back
to the hotel and try going into the safe.
The code to the safe he gives me is incorrect.
So with a concierge and security,
we go to the safe,
and they proceed to open it for us.
And upon opening the safe is a bag of cocaine
with the security to my right and hotel staff to my left.
He's putting me in a situation now where I could be arrested.
[tense music]
♪♪ ♪♪
And the way he had us do it was just so nonchalant,
and that's the type of shit I had to do for this person,
and this is the type of shit that I was bullied into.
It's fucking embarrassing.
Like, that's the situation I found myself in.
- During the course of our recording,
Martin shared some of the text messages
between him and Randall,
and they were really quite shocking.
Just the, you know, insults and demands.
And Martin tried so hard, it seemed like
from these text messages, to be the assistant
that he thought that Randall wanted and needed.
♪♪ ♪♪
ANNA: My name is Anna Szymanska,
and I'm from Poland,
and I was Randall's assistant for almost a year,
from March 2021 till February 2022.
When I started working for Randall, it was constant.
20, 24 hours, 7 days a week.
I didn't see a weekend.
One time, around 9:30 p.m.,
I get a text message
that his blood pressure has dropped,
and he needs coconut water and Muscle Milk.
I went to Ralphs.
I bought it.
And then I drove to his house.
I enter.
And you know, I can see him on the couch.
He wasn't wearing any shirt.
He shows me with a hand gesture to come in.
I take two steps in,
and I see him being totally naked.
I was, like, shocked.
And then he took a pillow and covered his intimate parts.
It was so disturbing to me.
It's impossible to, you know,
think that it was, you know, an accident.
Like, it's very weird, you know,
to be in that position as an assistant,
as a, you know, 24-year-old female
at that time.
♪♪ ♪♪
The way he acted around you was just disgusting,
terrifying, and so disrespectful.
He would talk to you with his hand down his pants.
He would pee with, like, open door.
Like, he would always take a phone call in the bathroom.
So he never flushed.
I was just, like, walking in, flushing his pee.
♪♪ ♪♪
BRETT: I told Randall in good faith that, like,
I had ADHD and some anxiety.
And I had to-- at, like, certain times,
I would have to take medication.
[scoffs] And one time,
we were in an elevator in Las Vegas,
and it was Randall, myself, and Lala,
and I was kind of, like, shaking,
and he was just like, "What's wrong with you?"
And I was like, "Oh, you know,"
like, I had just taken my Vyvanse.
He was like, "Oh, so you're, like, retarded?"
Lala in that moment was just like, "No.
"Like, lots of people take things like this.
So don't, like, say shit like that."
That's just not something you say to people, you know?
Especially today.
And then after that, it was just, like,
a downhill fucking spiral.
[tense music]
♪♪ ♪♪
- He called me Lovebox, which--
I don't know if you know,
but if you Google it, it means vagina--
and then motherfucker and fucker.
That was three insults that he would throw at me
constantly, especially when we played ping-pong.
You know, he thought it was funny,
but he also had this rage and anger.
One time when he lost a match with me,
he threw a wooden paddle across the whole office
and broke a glass door.
♪♪ ♪♪
[thunder rumbling]
[tense music]
BRETT: I asked Randall for one fucking day off
the entire time I worked for him.
It was the anniversary of my mom's death.
And he said, "Sure, sure. I got you on that."
And literally by noon, a phone call from a nanny.
And it was like, you know, "Mr. Randy needs you
"to come up here, come up to the house.
The dog--like, there's dog shit everywhere."
I had flowers in my car.
I was gonna go do something and put it out in the ocean.
And here I was in fucking Beverly Hills
at the top of a mountain cleaning up dog shit.
If that's me paying my dues,
then I should be directing
$200 million movies at this point.
And anybody that was an assistant for him
should do that as well,
'cause I feel like our dues were paid in full.
♪♪ ♪♪
MARTIN: Although he was awful to everyone,
there was a certain disdain that he had
for me in particular.
I just didn't want to believe it
to be what I suspected.
His disdain is usually targeted towards people of color
that I've witnessed time and time again.
The way he just categorized certain people spoke volumes.
When he would get mad at me, it was never like,
"You did..." so-and-so.
It was, "You people..."
And then you just have to stop and wonder,
who's "you people"?
♪♪ ♪♪
Him using the N-word was the moment for me,
the moment where,
this is unacceptable.
And now you're blatantly displaying acts
of, I mean, racism.
♪♪ ♪♪
And there are just some things you have to draw the line at.
And when you hear the N-word being used
is where I draw the line.
♪♪ ♪♪
At this point, I was just so disgusted.
I knew for my sanity
that I had to--I had to leave.
[tense music]
♪♪ ♪♪
-I feel like I'm, like--
it's, like, hitting me in real time
that I've invested so much into something
only to never want to do it again.
Like, the experience was so bad that I just have
no desire of ever staying in this industry.
♪♪ ♪♪
So when you ask me how I feel,
I'm, like, literally, like, realizing
how I feel right now, and I don't know.
It's frustrating. You're angry.
You're just pissed, and you just feel like
you were robbed of something.
You know what I mean?
You feel like something was, like, taken away
from me that they had no right to take.
Um...ahh.
[soft music]
♪♪ ♪♪
LISA: Randall and Lauren's relationship
started to fall apart really when Ocean came.
When Lauren had Ocean,
I basically stayed with my daughter the entire labor.
Randall asked Lauren if he could get
a hotel room for the night,
and obviously, we're like, "She's in labor.
She could have the baby at 3:00 in the morning.
So he got a room in the hospital,
and he had his assistant bring sheets and NyQuil,
pillows, Fireball whiskey.
I thought it was strange.
Very strange.
[siren wailing]
I was with her
the entire night that she was laboring.
In the morning, the nurse said that she's ready.
So I run down to Randall's room,
and I said, "If you don't come now,
you're gonna miss the birth of your child."
So he comes in,
they have the baby,
and by 9:00, he's gone for the day.
[thunder rumbling]
I started questioning Randall around that time.
I remember driving home in the car
with the baby and Lauren,
and Randall was driving,
and he was very curt with her.
And I basically had to tell him
that he needed to change his tone with her
because she had just had a baby.
And it was very upsetting, to the point
where he brought me to tears.
♪♪ ♪♪
HEATHER: That's when I was like--
I didn't confront her with it,
but I started to wonder,
"I wonder if she's having any doubts."
♪♪ ♪♪
LISA: He was never home anymore.
Um, he had mentioned to my son that you don't need
to be around for the first two years
'cause they don't remember it.
I think Lauren was seeing the red flags.
Um, she wasn't happy.
Um, I told her she's depressed.
She would sit in her bathrobe in bed on multiple occasions
and just watch TV and not leave the house,
and it was depression.
It made me feel very sad
to have your daughter living her life that way.
[somber music]
♪♪ ♪♪
[mellow guitar music]
♪♪ ♪♪
AMY: In October 2021,
Katie, who is a cast member on Vanderpump Rules,
sent Lala some pictures
she had seen circulating online.
The pictures were not particularly juicy
in terms of, like, content, but they showed Randall
coming out of an elevator with two women
and crossing the street with two women in Nashville.
- He denied any cheating allegations.
Looked me dead in the eye and told me,
"I would never cheat on your daughter."
[camera shutter clicking]
HEATHER: He had texted me, like, to call him.
And I'm like, what is this?
And he's immediately like, "Oh, my God.
It's such bullshit," you know,
"These are the two girls, and nothing,"
and he's like, "If you could, just know,
call Lala," blah, blah, blah.
And I call Lala.
I go, "Lala, just really,
"really, like, do the research.
Like, really make sure."
I absolutely wanted to give Randall
the benefit of the doubt.
Randall is gonna cheat when he's a public figure
and she's a public figure?
Like--and like, who has time?
Like, I just thought it was the craziest story.
AMY: As speculation grew that Randall may have cheated,
the Vanderpump world reacted,
and many started discussing the news on podcasts.
- It's crazy because she really didn't know.
It's not like, "Oh, well, I maybe thought this,
or I maybe thought that."
Like, she was blindsided
with all of this information.
- So everyone was finding out at the same time.
And so obviously, no, we-- me and Beau cut Randall off.
- How could I not have been smarter?
How is my daughter having to pay for my stupidity
and me keeping my blinders on
and not wanting to see red flags?
Like, I beat myself up over that daily.
- After the photographs surfaced
of his cheating allegations,
Lauren wanted to get ahold of his phone.
She had told me that he saw--he saw black.
Like, he was gonna do
whatever it took to get the phone back.
He tackled her to the ground.
- Randall has denied that that happened.
He says that there was an altercation over the phone,
but that he never tackled her or, like,
uh, physically harmed her in any way.
- Randall called me and told me about the altercation
with the phone and stated that, you know,
she had scratched him
and also hit him with a child stool.
I felt in disbelief when I heard the story.
- We had the fight--
- And the fight was about Nashville.
- The fight was about Nashville.
And then messages-- - So did you find--
- Messages were coming in.
And I was showing him, like, are you fucking kidding me?
And then I knew it's time to bite my tongue.
He's not gonna know a single thing.
You gotta put on a brave face.
You gotta call him babe.
I just gotta work through this,
just like, stay on the other side of the house.
And the whole time, I was just waiting.
- It seems at that point,
Lala was determined to leave Randall.
She just needed to wait for the right moment.
- So Randall came into the room one day
and said that he needed to go to Miami to go for work.
He takes off from the house,
and Lauren talks to his assistant,
and lo and behold, he's already on the airplane.
So at that point, we threw everything into cars
and a van and took off and basically escaped.
- The next day, he called me, being very unsettled.
He asked me to go to the house.
[tense music]
I went to my car,
and I was driving to the house,
and it takes, you know, a few minutes to drive there,
but he was so impatient.
He called me six, seven times on my way.
He was just like, "Are you there?
"Are you at that, you know, corner?
Are you there?"
You could feel something is wrong.
I entered.
Nobody was there.
He asked me to go to the bedroom.
I went.
I knocked.
I entered.
It--it was empty.
Like, Lala wasn't there.
And then he's like, "Check the wardrobe."
And I go to the wardrobe, uh,
and you know, my heart started beating real fast,
'cause I realized Lala moved out.
[camera shutter clicking]
♪♪ ♪♪
I sent him a picture of an empty closet, you know?
It had so much, like, life before,
like Lala's bright, full designer,
you know, purses and clothes.
And it was suddenly empty.
I told Randall, like, it's gone.
Like, she's gone.
And he--he was like, "Are you fucking kidding me?"
♪♪ ♪♪
MEG: That was it.
Lala had left Randall
and had taken their daughter, Ocean, with her.
That day marked the end of the relationship.
♪♪ ♪♪
AMY: All this drama and Randall's alleged cheating
became a huge story on Vanderpump Rules.
- I just heard--
I heard, like, some sexual rumors, okay?
- Can you speak up for me over here?
- Sexual rumors, okay?
- What kind of... - Like, you know...
- Sexual rumors?
- Just hotel room, staff, girls, meeting up--
- Lovely.
- I saw him buying drinks with, like,
two of the hottest girls that walked into SUR, okay?
Baby was already born at this point, by the way.
And like, it was... - Really?
JAMES: Touchy-feely [bleep] at the bar.
And I was like, "Oh, my God."
Like, I was the one like,
"Doesn't anyone not [bleep] see Randall?"
[overlapping chatter]
- The cheating is horrible, but you've completely
cut me out of your life for hanging out with someone
seven months afterwards.
- And I don't ask for much, Schwartz.
I would never, over cheating,
say you cannot hang out with someone.
I thought on the rooftop I was very clear.
I'm going into something
that is going to be life-changing for me.
And if you don't want to be on my team, that's fine,
but I can't have you around me.
- One of the things that was kind of most disturbing
and really, we felt, out of the ordinary
was these assistants allegedly were asked
to send money to random women through Apple Pay
so it would be on their accounts,
buy plane tickets for women,
cover a lot of expenses that are not normal or ordinary,
not even in Hollywood.
BRETT: His name was never on the rooms
in which any of his women friends would be staying.
Like, my card was usually put down,
or somebody, the other assistant
would be put down for incidentals.
One of the things about it always was that
you were never to say any names.
And the mistake I made--
the next day, I was like, "How would you like me
to handle so-and-so's flight?"
And I said the name out loud.
And he looked at me dead in the face
and said, "If you ever say that name again
or say anybody's name again, I'll fucking fire you."
♪♪ ♪♪
- We found a woman who claimed that,
during his relationship with Lala,
he started texting her out of the blue.
EVA: My name is Eva.
And this guy Randall sent me messages
without even knowing me or who I am.
"Hey, do you want to come to Puerto Rico?
"I'll pay you $4,000 for a speaking role.
"Let me be your sugar daddy.
"I want you in this movie with Megan Fox.
"Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey.
"Want me to be your sugar daddy?
"Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey.
"I'll send my Rolls-Royce.
Hey. Why aren't you responding?"
I didn't say it, but I'm just--
in my head, I'm like, laughing.
And it's just the disregard of me never responding
or never wanting,
and also him not knowing who I am as a human
to, like, think I'm someone that you could buy.
AMY: It was very difficult to convince people
to go on the record,
as it often is in investigations like this.
People said that they were fearful of the money
and perceived power that Randall still had
in the business.
They thought if they went public against him
that he might retaliate in some way
or tarnish their name in some way.
- At the same time his personal life was unraveling,
Randall's business empire, Emmett/Furla/Oasis,
was facing significant legal challenges,
including one from a former assistant.
AMY: So Martin would go on to sue Randall.
And initially, he thought he was only going to be seeking
reimbursement for some of those expenses,
but it ended up becoming a much bigger claim
that involved emotional distress
and other forms of abuse.
MEG: And he sued Randall this past year
for a number of wage violations
and for race discrimination.
Randall denies all of this.
- Martin and Randall came to a confidential settlement,
so the case has been dismissed.
- What I will say is,
based on my experience with the language
and the treatment I endured and observed,
I've never dealt with that type of treatment
in any other setting, nor have I till this day.
- In a lot of the court filings and the lawsuits,
Randall and George Furla say that it was the pandemic
that really crushed their business.
The documents show that they were
really struggling before then.
[soft music]
Randall's been sued individually,
and Emmett/Furla/Oasis production firm
have been sued.
You know, there's so many lawsuits that are really
targeting Emmett/Furla/Oasis that a year ago,
Randall just left that company and started a new company
called Convergence Entertainment.
Emmett is still producing and directing
under his new banner.
♪♪ ♪♪
[somber music]
♪♪ ♪♪
- Once we moved out, lawyers were involved,
and the case began for child custody.
If she didn't have Ocean,
she could have walked away from this unscathed, you know?
Learn from your mistakes.
But when you have a baby,
it's a whole different ball game.
Like, we're fighting for custody of this baby.
It's not a small feat.
- Without Ocean, I would have just moved on
with my life, right?
But because I have her, I have to put up a big fight
to not only protect her, but she opened up the door
for many to come to me and share
their story about Randall.
[tense music]
AMY: We spoke to a lot of assistants.
And the through-line in our conversations with them
was how even just a few months working for Randall
had years later stuck with some of these people.
You know, they were breaking down in tears.
And so many had left town.
♪♪ ♪♪
It really tainted the waters for a lot of people,
you know, killed the dream of working in this town,
and also made it difficult for them to trust
that they might have bosses who could respect them
and not treat them in such an emotionally abusive way.
MEG: The people who stepped up and said, "Yes, you know,
"this is not the way that we should treat people"
and I'll put my name on it," were incredibly brave.
And without them, this story wouldn't have been told.
♪♪ ♪♪
[camera shutter clicking]
AMY: The article was published in June 2022.
It was called "The man who played Hollywood:
Inside Randall Emmett's crumbling empire."
- The reaction was--was big.
I mean, there was a huge interest
by people in Hollywood that have known Randall,
who have worked with him.
There was also sort of this subculture
of Randall the character
that people knew from the reality TV show.
AMY: Even though Randall and Lala
are no longer together,
their relationship is a big part
of this season on Vanderpump Rules,
as is the publication of the LA Times article.
In the first couple of episodes alone,
they're discussing how Lala was surprised to read it
and how the cast members are reacting to it.
- LA Times article seemed to be the tip of the iceberg,
yet didn't even include some of the most horrific things
that I've been told.
AMY: In recent months, there's been another big twist
in the story involving Ambyr Childers,
Randall's ex-wife.
PHOTOGRAPHER: Ambyr, right here.
Ambyr, turn this way.
AMY: Ambyr requested a temporary restraining order
against Randall Emmett.
In the request, which was filed in court,
she said that the FBI had actually contacted her
about Randall.
[dramatic music]
♪♪ ♪♪
- That's when it came out.
She said, "I've been contacted by the FBI."
- So it looks like Randall Emmett's ex,
Ambyr Childers, was granted
a temporary restraining order against her ex-husband,
Randall Emmett, in a Los Angeles court
last month after citing a supposed FBI investigation
against the film producer.
♪♪ ♪♪
AMY: Later, Randall and Ambyr came to an agreement
and the restraining order was dissolved.
Once we published that story, Randall went on Instagram
and denied that the FBI was looking into him
and said that everything Ambyr was claiming was false.
I'm gonna play the video now.
RANDALL: Happy Friday, everybody.
Um, I am at a place where I felt I had to come on here
and say something that actually was the truth versus,
you know, the last 11, 12, 14 months
that the things have been said about me--
everything under the sun.
You know, narcissist, cheater.
But at the end of the day, you know,
I took the high road because I have
three beautiful girls that I didn't want to be out there.
I didn't want to have to do this, but at this point,
you know, the lies have been stretched so far.
Um...
we spent today getting confirmation,
because we knew there was no truthfulness to any of this
that the FBI has never been investigating me,
and isn't investigating me
because there's nothing to investigate.
But unfortunately, in this culture,
you can just say whatever you want.
And--and--and--and-- and--and--and--and--
and then it gets written about.
And then that's, you know, considered "truth"
in this cancel culture.
- Okay, I got a lot...
[laughs] I got a lot to say.
Oh, God, "cancel culture."
[sighs]
There's a quote I worked on about accountability.
"When you are used to impunity,
accountability feels like injustice."
And when I think about Randall claiming himself
a victim of cancel culture,
claiming himself a target of smear campaigns,
I think about this quote.
And it's just astounding that he's somewhere
still playing the victim, still feeling like
he's the one who's being persecuted
when what he has actually done
is damage and hurt other people.
- Um...
Ye--uh...
my thought--I--in all honesty,
there are so many things that go through my head
after watching it.
It's sickening to me.
- It makes me angry.
It makes me upset.
I don't understand how someone could do this.
♪♪ ♪♪
- I hate him.
I hate Randall Emmett.
♪♪ ♪♪
AMY: Since our original investigation was published
in June 2022, we have heard from numerous new people
who say that they had experiences with Randall
that they're debating coming forward with.
And so, you know, we are in the process
of reporting those out,
seeing if we can vet them and corroborate them.
And we're absolutely open to following the story more.
If law enforcement is allegedly looking into Randall,
then that's a story we'll be following as well.
- I really and truly want things to change.
I do think that we can change this business.
Putting up with something that is abusive
or, God forbid, life-threatening,
it's not a badge of honor to put up with garbage.
It's not a badge of honor to put up with toxicity.
It's abuse.
TERESA: It's important to me to share my story
of what happened, because there are still
a lot of Randall Emmetts out there.
Randall continues to operate as business as usual.
There's a better way to do all of it.
And I've seen how it can work.
And I've seen how wonderful it can be
when you're working in an environment that's healthy
and creative and fun and inspiring.
It doesn't have to be terrible.
This town does not have to chew you up and spit you out.
♪♪ ♪♪
MARTIN: I definitely hope my story resonates
and helps some people, because I know it's hard
to sit in front of a camera like this
and share it to the world that you were subjected
to heinous abuse,
discrimination,
bullying, harassment.
ANNA: There's so many talented people
in Hollywood and in the United States
and around the world who just need the voice.
And you know, they want to work.
And they're capable of great things,
but they're not given a chance.
BRETT: I can walk away knowing that I told the truth
and know in my heart that I did what I could
to make sure it doesn't happen again.
♪♪ ♪♪
MARTIN: To take that awful experience
and shift it into something
to inspire change and get people to stand their ground,
I think, was well worth it--
is well worth it.
[soft music]
♪♪ ♪♪