Ryan Bailey Talks 'Vanderpump Rules' Season 11, 'So Bad It's Good' Podcast Inspiration (Exclusive)

Ryan Bailey is "nervous for everyone" going into Vanderpump Rules Season 11. The host of So Bad It's Good With Ryan Bailey, a daily podcast presented by Betches Media, sat down with PopCulture.com ahead of Monday's release of the new Vanderpump Rules trailer, opening up about everything from where the Bravo show goes post-Scandoval to his own experience turning a Hollywood dream into a popular podcast.

Bailey had been "friendly" with Tom Sandoval and Ariana Madix, interviewing the duo prior to the cheating scandal that rocked Vanderpump Rules. He admits he's curious to see how the audience responds to Sandoval's attempt at a "redemption season" when the show returns on Tuesday, Jan. 30, especially as Rachel Leviss, the other party involved in Sandoval's affair, has decided not to return to the Bravo show.

"This happened between three people and one of those people did not do the show," Bailey explained. "Tom is going to be able to present a narrative that he might believe, but it might not be the actual truth. And I think that can be a little dangerous of [what] he's going to say." Having previously heard Sandoval's argument that his cheating on Madix was motivated by nothing but true love for Leviss, Bailey theorizes that if Leviss were to tell her side of the story, it would be "a little bit different."

"The other thing that I'm looking out for, which always frustrates me, is potentially turning Ariana into some sort of villain because she got great success from this," Bailey continued, pointing out that he doesn't understand why some fans see Madix's brand opportunities, Dancing With the Stars appearance and upcoming Broadway debut as "too much." He explained, "I think it's interesting that people only want women to have so much and then they get too much and then they turn against them. And I always see that, 'Well, I got cheated on. I didn't get Dancing with the Stars.' Of course you didn't. You're not on a TV show."

Regardless of how Season 11 goes, Bailey thinks the national reaction to the Scandoval "says a lot," especially when it comes to the impact of reality television in 2023. " I've talked to so many women about their own stories with men cheating on them," he shared. "To have that kind of conversation based around reality television and to have it break national news, I was so proud as a reality show fan [like] see, I'm not wasting my life!"

Bailey has always been drawn to the spotlight, having grown up in the small town of Olathe, Kansas with Hollywood stars in his eyes. "I grew up there and we were on this block with a bunch of kids. It was a really amazing way to grow up, but a lot of the guys liked sports and all the girls on the streets loved music and TV and movies, and I just more loved the girls and their tastes and things of that nature," he recalled. 

Heading out to Los Angeles when he got older, Bailey would get work as an actor on shows like The Office, How I Met Your Mother and Criminal Minds, but he was never "captain of [his] own ship" until he started his own show during the pandemic. "I always loved watching reality television. ... so it was this natural progression of starting to guest on other people's podcasts that did reality and then thinking, 'Could I ever possibly do this myself?'"

Bailey really found his audience with So Bad It's Good, eventually taking his podcast from an independent venture to a Betches Media endeavor after having Betches co-founder Sami Sage on his podcast. "Everything with Betches, I align with their views," Bailey noted, saying that while it's a traditionally woman-centric audience, he has "really strong female taste" and looks to the women in his life as inspiration. "They're also everybody in my life that I truly have loved so dearly. My mom or my best friend, they're all women," he said. "I don't want to be the head of the table, but I'm so excited to be at the table, and Betches has been so amazing."