When Leah McSweeney said, “Bitch, I elevate this shit,†we didn’t think she meant physically fling shit into the air. But the Real Housewives of New York City alum doesn’t fail to shock and awe. In July, rumors swirled on social media that McSweeney was “forcibly escorted off the set of UGT3 and was sent home early after she threw elephant dung at a castmate.†This rumor referred to the filming of The Real Housewives: Ultimate Girls Trip season 3, which will follow McSweeney, Potomac’s Candiace Dillard Bassett and Gizelle Bryant, Miami’s Alexia Echevarria and Marysol Patton, Salt Lake City’s Heather Gay and Whitney Rose, and Atlanta’s Porsha Williams on a cross-franchise trip to Thailand.
At a BravoCon panel in New York City on October 14, Bravo producer Shanae Humphrey confirmed that, yes, it seemed as though McSweeney threw elephant dung at her co-workers on set but that she meant to sling mud in a playful way and it just happened to be, er, contaminated because the women were at a “bathing with elephants†experience at an elephant sanctuary. There was “probably some fecal matter in there,†said producer Lisa Shannon. But it wasn’t thrown in aggression. “She was just trying to get the other ladies to join the party!†Shannon said.
This account of events is in line with what Rose told E! News in August: “No, she did not pick up elephant poop and throw it. We were at an elephant sanctuary, and we were bathing with the elephants, and there was some horsing around. So a mud fight is naturally gonna happen, but, no — she didn’t pick up poop and throw it at someone. But, yes, there were things thrown.†So that clears up that elephant (poop) in the room.