Bruce Glikas/Bruce Glikas/FilmMagicOh, what could have been!
After being romantically linked last summer, Bethenny Frankel invited Modern Family's Eric Stonestreet to be a guest on her SiriusXM show, B Real with Bethenny, Wednesday morning. "People want to clear up our dating rumors, so you can clear them up or I can clear them up," Frankel said. "I mean, are we getting engaged today on the radio? Should we tell everybody?"
"Well, I did bring a ring," Stonestreet joked.
"You did? How big is it?" Frankel asked. "Because that will really determine my answer."
"Let's just say that I had somebody help me carry it in," Stonestreet joked.
Frankel, 45, said she met Stonestreet, 44, through a friend at a "douchey, Hollywood industry party" last spring. "As you had no idea I was straight in real life, I had no idea who you were. Sorry!" Stonestreet said. "When she said, 'This is the queen of reality,' I thought...she meant you were like the queen bee reality agent. You were like a CAA agent that would put me on a show. I'm like, 'OK, yeah. Thank you. Nice to meet you. So good.' As I started talking to you, she said something about Skinnygirl, and I said to you, 'Oh my God! You created Skinnygirl?'"
"And then what did you say next?" Frankel asked.
"'You've gotten me laid,'" Stonestreet said.
As they continued to talk, Stonestreet touched Frankel's leather skirt and joked that it was so thick she must have been "expecting some sort of arrow warfare from Vikings." According to the Real Housewives of New York City star, "I had a premonition that I'd meet some sort of animal like you that would try to penetrate the skirt." They exchanged phone numbers, but Frankel didn't think much of it. "I thought we were going to be shopping for skirts together."
Later, when Frankel was leaving with another man in tow, a "wasted" Stonestreet stopped her. "I said, 'Why are you talking to these guys? I'm the most interesting person here,'" he recalled.
"Exactly! And I thought that was very confident and I liked that, but I still thought you were gay," Frankel said. "Not until I got home did I realize—"
"—I was in your bed?" Stonestreet joked.
"Yes! When I looked over at you and you weren't interested in the guy I brought home for you, I thought, 'Oh, I'll have him for myself,'" Frankel said with a laugh. "So, I texted you and said, 'Holy s--t! You're an amazing actor. No! I asked my assistants: 'Is Eric Stonestreet [gay]?' Because I didn't even know your name. I knew you were Cam [a character on Modern Family]. I said, 'Is he gay?' And they said, 'F--k no! He's from Kansas City. He's such a guys' guy. He's into sports. I was like, 'Oh!' And then we had lunch the next day, and here we are getting engaged."
The paparazzi caught Frankel and Stonestreet out and about twice after their first encounter. "I got so many texts about all of that from people like, 'Please tell me it's true,'" Stonestreet said.
Frankel asked, "Did you get more laid because of it? That's what I want to know. Because I have done it for other people, too." The Emmy winner laughed and responded, "No, I get laid plenty!"
"I know, but it could help a little," Frankel said. "Every little bit counts."
Together, Frankel and Stonestreet devised a system to measure whether their romance rumors improved the actor's sex life. "Why don't I take videos and send them to you of every girl with a testimonial," Stonestreet said. "'Thank you, Bethenny: I f--ked Eric Stonestreet because of you.'"