Part two of Joe and Teresa Giudice’s interview with Andy Cohen on Watch What Happens Live aired tonight and they didn’t disappoint. The Real Housewives of New Jersey stars talked about their prison sentences, their current financial situation (broke, broke, broke), their support systems, why they continue doing the reality show and so much more.
Andy starts right off with Teresa’s claims in court that the show is fake. “In court papers you claim that The Real Housewives of New Jersey is scripted. ‘It is little more than a work of fiction engineered by Bravo TV through scripted lines and clever editing.’ What did you mean by that?” Teresa responds, “Meaning that there are editors on the show and our producers”, Andy cuts her off “were you told to flip the table?” Teresa says “no flipping the table I did.” Andy asks if she was told to fight with Melissa or Joe Gorga. “My family coming on the show, you know Andy, I didn’t know they were coming on the show.” Andy says “you didn’t want them on the show,” Teresa jumps in “not that I didn’t want them on the show, they never told me they were coming on the show.” Andy tries to end it with “we’ve had this discussion many times, ya ya ya.” Teresa says “When my family came on, I didn’t like the way I was portrayed. I was the villain, I was this mean person. People would come up to me and they’re like ‘oh my God you’re so nice’ and I’m like ‘what do you mean?’ and they’re like ‘you come off so mean on the show.”
CLICK THE CONTINUE READING BUTTON FOR THE REST
Andy asks if she was putting on an act this season. “A lot of people suggested on social media that you were on your best behavior this season and just kind of putting on a show so you could gain favor with the judge.” Teresa says what we saw was the real Teresa. “And that’s my point. I’ve grown from season one. I’m not gonna let people provoke me. I’m not gonna lose my temper. I’ve been through a lot. I’m just gonna try to be a better person. I learned from my mistakes and I’m also going to do it for my daughters.”
Andy: “there’s been a chorus of people as the show has aired this season who felt that you shouldn’t be on the show because of the charges and your guilty plea. Teresa responds, “I’m a working mom, I’m supporting my family and that’s the reason why I was on the show. Everything I do, Andy, I do for my daughters. I just want them to have a good life.” Joe says “at this point, why get off? At this point everyone knows who you are. It doesn’t make a difference. So now you get off (the show) and what do you do? Everyone’s still going to say ‘hey there goes Joe, there goes Teresa’.”
Andy says “When you were here last, you blamed being the show as a reason for these charges. Do you still blame The Real Housewives of New Jersey for your troubles?” Joe says “No, no I don’t blame anybody.” Teresa agrees with him, “I take responsibility.”
Andy asks Teresa if she thinks she’d be going to jail if she had never done the show. “I’m not going to answer that.”
Andy doesn’t mince words when asking about their asset disclosure omissions. “The judge lectured both of you for failing to report a variety of assets on your pre-sentencing financial disclosure statement. ATVs, Jewelry, construction equipment. Isn’t this similar to what got you into hot water in the first place? Falsifying documents. Teresa says “no. Like I said, I wasn’t aware that we needed to put all that information down. If I would’ve known, believe me. I wish our accountant would’ve came to our house and walked through our house and then filled out the paperwork. I didn’t know. If I would’ve known, believe me, I would’ve never not put it down.” Joe says he walked the probation guy through the house so he could see that they weren’t hiding anything.
Andy doesn’t let them off easy, “You listed only $25,000 in home furnishings for a $3 million house.” Teresa replies, “how Joe came up with the $25,000 on our bankruptcy..” Joe interrupts her here and she snaps at him to let her talk. This happens three times in a row as she tries to explain herself. Joe says the goods were valued at $50K back when they filed bankruptcy four years ago so it’s worth about half at this point – like their bed, etc.
And on that worthless jewelry: “You listed your jewelry as worth nothing.” Teresa says her attorney got up during court and said that Teresa did tell him to list her engagement ring, wedding band, Joe’s wedding ring and his Rolex.” Andy says “your earrings I’m looking at.” She says “these are not real. I wear a lot of costume jewelry. Cuz my whole thing is diamond earrings, they could fall down the drain. So my attorney got up and said ‘she did tell me and I didn’t put it down’.”
Andy brings up their failure to pay the required money to the court. “You were supposed to pay the court $200,000 before your sentencing hearing and you had months to do it yet it didn’t happen. Why didn’t you pay up before you went to court?” Teresa admits they’re broke. “You know, first of all, we didn’t have the money.” Joe says he had it set up and then “I don’t know what happened, I mean..whatever. It was there, it just wasn’t..I don’t know.” Again Teresa cuts him off and says “can I speak?.” She continues “yeah, so we didn’t have the money.”
Andy asks if they thought about selling their stuff in order to raise the money? Teresa says they sold an old Corvette and currently have all three of their houses for sale.
Andy brings up Joe’s deportation possibility. “Joe you’re not an American citizen. There’s a chance you could be deported because you’re now a convicted felon. Are you worried about being deported after you serve time?” Joe says “I’m gonna worry about that when the time comes.” Andy asks “Is there anywhere in the back of your mind where you think ‘in five years we’re all gonna be living in Italy?’ Joe says it wouldn’t be a bad thing. Teresa adds, “it’s in God’s hands.” Joe says “you gotta think about moment by moment, day by day. You can’t think about five years from now.” Teresa “you know, that’s what gets everyone. They’re like ‘how are you so strong?’ and I just go day by day.” Joe says there’s no guarantee any of us will even be here in five years. Teresa says like with Joe’s dad, they never saw it coming. They talk about the shock of losing Joe’s dad so suddenly and how close he and Joe were.
Andy asks what words of wisdom Joe’s father would be telling them. Joe thinks he’d say “just to stay strong and don’t worry about it, we’ll get through it. He was a strong guy but all this stuff was hurting him. It was eating him up. I’d do ten years just to see him again.” They agree that he would’ve been torn up about Teresa having to go to prison. Teresa says that he was the type to cry and always get touched by things even though he was a tough guy, he was a mush over small things.
They then discuss Joe’s recently revealed drinking problem. He says that before Teresa joined The Real Housewives of New Jersey he only drank a little on weekends and now he drinks every day. “Just wine, I don’t really drink anything else really.” Andy asks if he thinks he has a problem. He admits that he does and Teresa says it has gotten worse with his dad passing. He says he can easily drink 2 bottles of wine alone and that it’s like drinking a milk for him – he can do it like nothing. Teresa says that Joe claims it helps him sleep. Joe says that it’s that or taking a pill and he doesn’t want to take a pill.
Andy asks him how he’s going to get help for the drinking while Teresa is away for a year. Joe says he doesn’t obsess about the drinking. He takes care of business during the day and has a few bottles before he goes to sleep and that the kids are usually in bed by then. Teresa says “he’s not like drinking and driving. Every time he drinks he’s home and if he goes out with friends to dinner, he has someone drive him.”
Andy asks about the driver’s license case with the state of New Jersey. Teresa tells Joe not to answer that yet. Joe says they’re still figuring it out and we’ll know October 15th. Andy asks if he’s worried about facing more jail time for that. Teresa says he can’t talk about that.
Next Andy brings up her relationship with Melissa and Joe Gorga. “Last time you were here you said Melissa and Joe hadn’t been really supportive of what’s going on. What’s your relationship with them now?” Tre says “Everything is good with my brother and his wife. He called me last night and he was hysterical crying. Crying like a baby. He wanted to come to court and I told him not to. I didn’t want any of my family there. I just wanted to be in and out. It’s my problem, I wanted to deal with it by myself.”
Andy asks, “was it meaningful to you that he wanted to be in court?” She says “Yes, I’m glad he asked me and he wanted to be there.” Andy asks if she’ll use Melissa and Joe as a help/support when she goes away. “I want my husband to be there for my daughters.” Andy asks her again and she says no, she will not be leaning on them for support. Juicy has a lot of family and she wants him to be there for the girls. “What breaks my heart is that I don’t want to be away from my dad. My dad is in and out of the hospital and after what happened with Joe’s dad, that’s what scares me.” She then tells Andy that she told her brother Joe that all she wants from him is to be sure that he sees their parents every week while she’s in prison. She says that she texted that request to Joe (Gorga) but he never replied, although when she called her mom that morning she was on the phone with Joe, so that might mean he will take her request seriously. “That’s all I want for my brother to be there for my parents, because I’m there for my parents every day and I want him to be there for my parents and I want Joe (husband) to be Mr. Mom.”
Andy asks if she’s heard from any of her current cast mates since the sentencing. “Dina texted me and that’s it. Amber texted me before I went to court.” And then she says Jacqueline texted her, too and Andy asks what Jacs had to say. “I didn’t read it. I got so many texts, but I did see her name.”
Andy, “Have the charges affected your businesses?” Joe says that the case has killed all of it. Andy says “but you were doing appearances up until the last few weeks.” Teresa says she’s still doing Fabellini “but we put the money into Fabellini. With Fabellini we’re not making any money because we put the money in. We brought the container over from Italy, so we put the money out. So, it was like almost a lot.” Andy’s confused about “container of Fabellini.” They explain that the container full of Fabellini that was shipped here from Italy is almost gone now and it is located at a distribution office. She says again that they put out the money for the container and that they’re not making any money. “It’s like any new business. You have to put money into it.” Joe says “you got put a lot of money in before you start making money, so…”
Andy asks Teresa if that breaks her heart because she worked so hard on all these businesses. “Yeah it does. That’s the thing. It’s as if I’m being scrutinized and I’m working as everyone else is working, but because I’m on television I’m scrutinized so it affects my other businesses.”
Andy asks Joe what he’s doing for work right now. “I got my rentals and getting back into building as well.”
Andy: “are you worried about continuing with that now that you’ve been convicted of fraud? Are you worried about people wanting to do business with you?” He says no. He says now he’s going to make sure “everything is dotted the right way. I just have to do a little more work now. Before I didn’t really look at too much. Now I look at everything.” Teresa says “now I’m gonna be on top of him to make sure everything… You know, we got a new accountant and make sure everything is done right.”
If she could do it all over again, would she be on The Real Housewives? “That’s a hard question. I go back and forth. yes and no because you’re scrutinized, meaning like the public judges you. Like I was pregnant last week, did you see?”
Andy: “So let’s talk about rumors. The press suggests you’re leaving Joe as soon as he goes to prison.” She says “no”, but it’s actually not a very convincing no, in my humble opinion.
It was suggested that Teresa had her full hair and makeup and done before arriving to court. “No. I did my own makeup. My hair I had done the day before because I don’t know how to blowout my own hair. Pretty much every day when I run around with the girls, I slick my hair back. I wear a cap because I work out every day. I want to look presentable if I’m going to court.”
Andy: “The judge stated that this shouldn’t define you as a mom and you as a man. How does that make you feel?” Teresa says it made her feel good. “She did say a lot of nice things and she looked in our eyes when she was speaking to us. I think she cared.” Joe says “she was doing her job I guess.”
Will you let it define you? Teresa replies, “No, I know who I am. I admitted it, I made a mistake and I’m paying for my actions and throughout this whole thing I’m just gonna learn from my mistakes and be a better person.”
Andy says women who like Teresa may wonder if she has any resentment towards Joe for putting her in this position. “I don’t think he meant to hurt me in any way.”
Was Teresa angry at Joe when she found out what was going on? “I think it’s a learning lesson for both of us. I know he didn’t mean to hurt me in any way. Since yesterday he’s been feeling bad and keeps coming up to me and hugging me.” Andy asks Joe if he feels guilty. “I do. At the same time, what am I gonna do? I did everything I could to get her out of it, but it didn’t work.”
“How does it feel knowing that your actions resulted in your wife being a convicted felon and facing prison?” Joe says “Obviously not good. Definitely not good.”
Joe is asked if he has anything to say to Teresa. “I do. Actually I just want to apologize that I got you into this mess and I don’t even know what else to say. If I could take it all back I would, but I just can’t and I’m sorry you gotta go through this. I tried to do whatever I could to convince the judge but I had no control over that.” Teresa says “I love you” and Joe says “I love you, too.”
Teresa shares her final thoughts: “I want to apologize to the people out there I let down. And I wanna say I’m deeply sorry for what I’ve done.”
TELL US – DID TERESA COME OFF AS REMORSEFUL THIS TIME?
Photo Credit: Twitter
