Madison From 'Too Hot To Handle' Thinks Francesca & Harry Are A PR Stunt

Netflix's Too Hot to Handle (THTH) is the gift that keeps on giving. Though the show was filmed more than a year ago in April 2019, it sounds like the real drama happened after cameras stopped rolling. While you've probably heard by now that Harry Jowsey and Madison Wyborny had a thing after he broke up with Francesca Farago, I'm coming through with some more scalding hot tea: Apparently, Madison claims Harry and Francesca's relationship is a PR stunt.

On May 7, 2020, the Daily Mail Australia broke the news that, according to sources, Harry and Madison reportedly dated for months after "Frarry" (as Harry and Fran are called) went on hiatus in July 2019. A week later, Harry confirmed the relationship, but told The Daily Telegraph he and Madison were merely "friends with benefits." I spoke to Madison to get her side of the story for Elite Daily, and the L.A.-based model clarified what she and Harry had was a "real relationship." However, she did express some doubt about the authenticity of Harry and Francesca's relationship. "It's a joke, at the end of the day," she claims. "I'm trying to take everything very lightly because their relationship isn't going to last." Elite Daily reached out to both Harry and Francesca for comment on Madison's accusation but didn't hear back in time for publication.

According to Madison, much of what the Daily Mail reported on May 7 was true. She and Harry were "really good friends" during filming, and a few weeks after production wrapped on THTH, she says Harry replied to one of her IG Stories to ask for her number. They began talking frequently as friends, and when Harry's relationship with Fran started to sour, Madison became his confidant. "I don't really think he was that close with anyone else on the show," Madison says. "But he was really confiding in me with his girlfriend drama. I think that's just where our relationship kind of blossomed."

In June 2019, Madison says Harry invited her to join him on a trip to Bali, despite the fact he was still with Fran at the time. According to Madison, Fran didn't even know about the trip until Harry posted on IG asking his fans for Bali recommendations. "Of course I had a little crush on him, so I didn't want to put myself in a situation with him alone, when he had a girlfriend," she says. "I'm not that type of girl." In early July 2019, right after Francesca's trip to Australia (which apparently "ended really badly," based on Madison's claims, the couple decided to split.

Neither Fran nor Harry has spoken in detail about Fran's visit or the reason for their breakup — including a request for comment on the details of their breakup made by Elite Daily — though Harry did tell Us Weekly's Watch With Us podcast on May 14, 2020, that he and Fran "broke up on the worst terms." He said, "We just didn't see eye to eye on a couple of things and we had a really big fight. She went back to Vancouver, and I was on my farm with my mom and my chickens. ... And then it was just pretty much game over at that point." After Harry and Fran went their separate ways, Madison claims Fran went to Vegas to "party with her ex." (Fran posted plenty of pics and IG Stories from her Las Vegas trip, but did not share whether or not she was there with an ex.) Around this time, Harry asked Madison if she would visit him in Australia. "That's when we started seriously talking," she says.

Here's where things got kind of messy. Madison flew out to Australia in August 2019, when she and Harry "weren't even hooking up for the first two weeks of the trip," as it was the first time they'd seen each other since filming wrapped in late April 2019. A few days before the two were due to leave for New Zealand together, Madison says she stepped out of the bathroom of a Brisbane bar to find Harry making out with one of his female friends. She says Harry left the bar with that friend, and the next day, he reportedly asked Madison not to join him in New Zealand. She went back to L.A. alone, and a few days later, Harry made his official move to the city into a place just down the street from Madison. She was angry with the way he'd left things, but after Harry sent her a pic of himself in the shirt she'd bought him in Ibiza, the pair began talking again.

Despite living down the street from each other, the two didn't see each other again until Halloween, where she says some drunk-texting led to a hookup. In late November, Madison started spending nights at his apartment, at which point Harry reportedly apologized about what went down in Brisbane and initiated "the talk." As Madison says, "He was like, 'Look, if you're going to be coming over here and spending the night at my house and cuddling with me, I don't want to get my feelings hurt. I just want you to know that you're the only girl that I'm seeing. Are we going to start seeing each other so that we can get serious, or not?' And I was just like, 'OK. I'm down to give us another shot.'"

For a while, things went well. "We had no problems," Madison says. "Our relationship couldn't have been better." That is until early February 2020, when she claims Fran called Harry out of the blue to ask if she could post some old photos of them together after THTH dropped on Netflix in April. Madison claims Harry told her about the call, claiming he asked Fran not to share the pictures. (Elite Daily reached out to Harry to confirm Fran's phone call but did not hear back in time for publication.) "I really respected the fact that he even told me that Francesca called him," she says, "because he didn't even have to tell me that. So I looked at that as wow, he's really, he's really being respectful, and being honest with me."

A week later, on Feb. 26, Madison claims a close friend of Harry's posted an IG Story showing Fran and her dog at Harry's L.A. apartment, and she realized she'd been played. "He could have told me, 'Hey, I'm not really feeling this anymore. I'm going to get back with Francesca,'" says Madison. "Or he could have just been honest and been like, 'Look, I'm going to get back with Francesca for publicity reasons. If you still want to stay together, and we keep this thing quiet,' I would have been completely cool with that. Because the relationship we had was real. It wasn't for publicity. It wasn't for any of that." But rather than call him out, Madison says she replied to the Story with the shaka emoji, and she and Harry haven't spoken since. As she says, "It's obviously not worth fighting for if you'll give up a relationship so quick for some clout."

Harry told a different story on the Watch With Us podcast. "I was getting my life packed up and getting ready to move to L.A., so there was literally nothing at that point in time with us," he said of his relationship with Madison. "I was talking to other girls. I told her, we're not gonna be anything more than friends. She knew that. We had that conversation." He also claims he reached out to Madison after getting back together with Fran. "I texted [Madison] the other day to reach out and make sure everything was good," he said, "but she feels like I was being very disrespectful once we ended things or whatever." Later, he added, "I have love and respect for Madison and I do cherish the time that we had together."

A week after THTH dropped in April 2020, Fran and Harry went public with their relationship on IG. Madison points out how Fran and Harry couldn't seem to keep their story straight: "They're like, 'We broke up for a bit.' Then they're like, 'Well, we dated a few people in between.' And then this gets out and he's like, 'Oh, well, we just hooked up.' It's just messy, honestly." The most painful part: Madison claims Harry wasn't honest about the nature of their relationship. "It just hurts so bad to know someone you were basically in a full-on relationship with could say such hurtful things about you, just for publicity," she says.

While Madison is eager to put this whole ordeal with Harry behind her, she feels obligated to set the record straight, if only so fans know what she and Harry had wasn't a "friends with benefits" deal, as he claims. "If I was just going to be hooking up with someone, I would not go and broadcast that," she adds. "And I wouldn't be having this conversation with you right now, trying to say, 'Oh, we were a serious thing.' What am I going to gain from lying? ... I really hope that through this, people will really see his true colors."

To her, Fran and Harry's relationship seems more like "a business move" than the real thing. "I think it speaks volumes that Francesca [apparently] called Harry while we were still together to ask if she could post photos of them when the show airs," she says. "Harry saw he would get more clout by saying he is still dating the girl he was with on the show. Considering how negatively he would talk about Francesca to me, I would have never expected he'd get back together with her. So [their relationship] is 100% for publicity, and it's working."