Tami Roman Unpacks Trauma and Dysfunction in New BET Series ‘Haus of Vicious’ | EUR Exclusive

*We caught up with Tami Roman to dish about her new scripted series, “Haus of Vicious,” currently airing on BET. 

The 8-episode, one-hour drama series stars Roman as Chantel Vivian, a fashion designer, whose success is overshadowed by her narcissistic husband, addiction, unresolved childhood traumas and a dysfunctional personal life, per press release. 

Roman stars opposite Norman Nixon Jr. (Milan), Tiffany Black (Raven), Kyler O’Neal (Izzy), Brely Evans (Avery), Lyric Anderson (Tia), and industry veteran Ella Joyce (Carolyn), per Deadline. All the episodes of “Haus of Vicious” were directed by Hollywood veteran Kim Fields and with Roman, Marvin Neil, Eric Tomosunas, Herb Kimble, Kim Fields and creator/showrunner Jill Ramsey serving as Executive Producers.

Check out the trailer here and peep our full conversation with Roman below about her personal connection to the story.

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— IG: @TamiRoman (@TamiRoman) August 31, 2022

First off, congratulations on landing this new series. For inquiring minds who want to know…what makes Haus of Vicious unique compared to similar shows on networks and streaming services?

Tami: Quite honestly, my partner, Jill Ramsey, all of these characters are based on real situations that happened in her life over the course of her 15 years in the entertainment industry. So when you see us in certain situations, those situations are real. Where on other shows, there’s a room full of writers that are making up scenarios to be compelling, to have the drama, to be action-packed. This is what was really going on and the naturalness and the authenticity of it all is what we feel is going to bring people and keep eyes on Haus of Vicious.

You play a character named Chantel, how much of your own personality, or experiences in the industry, did you bring to this character?

I think there’s a lot of Tami in Chantel, from the aspect of coming up in a household where you had a very strong mother figure that it was inbred in you to be successful. Now, the differences are, my mother was far more positive than Carolyn, who’s played by Ella Joyce, was with Chantel in her younger days. So my mother used positive reinforcement versus beating you down, but the drive, the determination, the tenacity to succeed, I share that with Chantel. And it was very easy to inject that into the character.

With relationships, I’ve been in toxic relationships. I know what those feel like, what emotions those things drum up for me. I was able to inject that. I think because I’m on five different shows right now. So the most important thing for me to do with each of the characters is quite often not to put so much of myself into them because then I would be playing them all the same, but to create my own backstory for these characters so that they can have a life of their own. And that’s what I chose to do with Chantel.

What sort of obstacles and challenges will we see her navigate and overcome in this series?

I think Chantel’s going to have to come to a crossroad as it pertains to loyalty with people that she thinks are her friends, with intimacy issues, with people that she thinks that she loves, with betrayal issues from people that she thought never would I think. And I think, here again, that’s going to make Haus of Vicious special, because I think people at home are going to be able to identify with a lot of the challenges that Chantel is going to face.

How many of us out there have a group of friends and for all intents and purposes, when you’re all together, it’s all good, you think everybody’s loyal, you think it’s all love, love? And then slowly the house of cards begins to fall and you’re finding out that these people aren’t praying for you, they’re praying on you. And so Chantel has to deal with a lot of that. Here again, her friendship, her relationship with her husband, as well as her mother. What that relationship is really going to evolve into because there really is no love there. There’s more respect there, knowing that’s my mother, I respect you. And how are they going to grow from the past so that they can have a more positive future?

How would you describe Chantel’s dynamic with her narcissistic husband? Does she want to stay in this marriage, is it a marriage of convenience, a business arrangement?

I think it’s a marriage of love, but love that is dysfunctional, that she has to come to terms with that aspect, that it is dysfunctional and it evolves into a marriage that is a game of chess versus checkers. And the checkers aspect would be staying in a relationship with someone that isn’t all the way there and it’s convenient and it’s comfortable and you’ve known them, you’ve been with this person since high school and so you tolerate a lot of things. The chess aspect that Chantel’s going to have to grow into is the compartmentalizing of people in her life and understanding what purpose they serve and how does that purpose help her elevate where she’s trying to go, which ultimately she’s trying to be the most successful Black fashion designer that is traded on NASDAQ, and the first.

And of course, I love that this series focuses on a very powerful, very successful Black woman in the fashion world. What do you hope viewers take away after watching her journey? Would you say this serves as a cautionary tale for women? 

I want women to look at Chantel and find their strength. Because I think with Chantel’s life, it’s really a situation of weapons are always forming. And just taking it to the Word for a second, it doesn’t say that weapons will not form over the course of your life. It just says that they will not prosper, right? So for Chantel, weapons are constantly forming and how is she overcoming the challenges, the trials and the tribulations within her life without falling all the way down, and staying down? And how she is learning to build herself up to love herself enough to care more about herself than anyone else so that she can be a “whole” individual.

And a lot of women need to see that represented. So when you look at Chantel and as we’ve noticed, we see right out the gate, this relationship is toxic. This is about to be a mess, but as you continue to watch the series, you will start to see Chantel’s wheels start to turn in her head of wanting more, desiring more, but actually obtaining more. And within that more is respect, love, care, honesty, loyalty, comradery in all facets of her life. And we as women have to start demanding that for ourselves in real life, because a lot of us settle. So here again, we have all of the characters going through some really deep, dark things, but it’s the recovery that will come over the episodes and over the season that I want people to be able to take that message away.

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— IG: @TamiRoman (@TamiRoman) August 29, 2022

Your daughter Lyric also appears in this series. Mom and daughter working with the iconic Kim Fields.  How was that experience?

Tami Roman: Well, Kim Fields is a little spitfire firecracker who knows her stuff, okay? So she’s been in this business a long time and our actual dynamic was developed by way of her mother, because her mother was my acting coach for three years. So before I even met Kim, I knew Chip. And so we come from the same school of thought as it pertains to acting and having her be able to direct all eight episodes was a blessing for me as well as for the other actors, because she’s an actor-director. And what I mean by that, is she’s always concerned about the performance. You have directors who are concerned about the shot. She understands what an actor needs and what they want to see on the screen. And she was able to pull a lot of that out of every person that’s in this show to, push us and make us go deeper than where we even thought we were. So that was such a blessing.

And with Lyric, it was great to have my daughter in a project. I think the aspect of people say nepotism. And for clarity, Lyric auditioned for this role. I begged her to audition, but she still had to audition. And she went in there and she did what was needed for the character of Tia. All of the producers and the writers signed off on her.

I think the African American community is the only culture that when people are successful, we look at it as a downtrodden thing to elevate, help assist people in our family. Other races and nationalities, when they get on, nobody says anything about so and so’s daughter, so and so’s cousin, so and so’s auntie, somebody’s working in makeup. Nobody says anything about that, but the minute we do it’s like she only got the role because her mom was the EP. And I just want to provide some clarity to that. She got the role because she’s talented and she worked to be here and she did everything that was required. And if she did get the role because I’m her mama, what is wrong with helping uplift your family?

Amen to that. My last question has to do with your experience on MTV’s “Real World.” Do you remember at the end of the season, the cast is asked one of those “Where do you see your fellow cast member years from now” type questions, and Jon said you would be a star and spar with women on reality TV (a la Basketball Wives), and his prediction was spot on! 

Tami: Wow, I haven’t seen that. So I didn’t know he said that. He said that in ’93?

He surely did. And I said, if I ever get a chance to interview Tami, I’m going to ask her what she thinks about that. He called it, as far as you becoming a reality TV star. You’re certainly living the dream!

Yeah. I didn’t know that he said that. But quite honestly, I had no intentions on returning to reality TV. I got on Basketball Wives and that sparked this new era of reality TV for me. He [John] said it back then and that’s kind of what happened. And now, leaving reality TV momentarily and focusing more on scripted, doing what I was trained to do, is where my focus is. And I’m loving every single minute of it. Not just with Haus of Vicious, but with The Ms Pat Show, with Truth Be Told, and then my version of reality TV, Caught in the Act: Unfaithful. So I’m excited about where I am right now.

And of course, we can’t forget that your fans love The Bonnet Chronicles. 

Yes, yes, yes. And I’m struggling now because it’s like everything that I could have talked about, I felt like I have said what was on my mind. And so because I work so much now, I’m not out people watching to get more things to complain about. Because I’m always on set, but I love doing Bonnet Chronicles and I love that everybody loves it and hopefully I’ll get back on the road. Because I did a 10-city comedy tour, maybe two summers ago and I enjoyed that. So once I free up some time, I might be get back out on the road and do another little standup tour.

Tune in to “Haus of Vicious” Wednesdays at 8/7c on BET and you can stream the series on HULU.

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