April 1, 2020 • 47 mins
How does the idea for a show like Love is Blind happen?
We are taking you behind the scenes with the creator to give you all the insight you can dream of!
Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:07):
It's another episode of Love Insight. Love Insight, the podcast
that covers the Love is Blind global phenomenon. I keep
calling it a global phenomenon because everywhere we go it grows.
I mean, it is remarkable. We are at the time
we are recording this podcast, just a couple of weeks,
not even a month removed from its debut, and uh
yet it is still a topic of conversation, one of
(00:29):
the hottest pop culture topics of conversation. Go on the
voice you just heard Giannina Milady Jabelly g Yeah, I
get to call it Gene now, yes you do. And
we have already learned a whole lot. We have had
an extended conversation with Rory, someone who had about three
minutes of air time. We've had an extended conversation with
Carlton uh and obviously we got to hear your backstory
(00:51):
because you are the host of this pod. But right
now we get to have a discussion with the reason
we're here without the big brain of Chris Cool and
we're not sitting here right now. My third dad is
that what you call him your dad? Because I feel
like he created me in a way, or he was
able to open up a side of me in a
way that no one else has been able to. How
(01:11):
often do you hear that, Chris? Never? This is the
first first time. Yeah, but that's stuff you got. You
got thirty children now that you are already I had
four before. Now. Yes, Chris, you are the creator the
I don't even know all the titles I should attach,
producer everything, executive producer, all of those that right? Am
I getting it right? Am I correct? All of those?
(01:33):
How did you come up with it? Um? You know?
I think we wanted to create a show for Netflix. Um.
Netflix is a global platform and we've done a lot
of relationship shows in the past. Um, you know married
at first sight of the show that we do have
done seven year switch Brian prejudice and thinking about what
unites people worldwide. What everyone in the world wants to feel.
(01:55):
It's to be loved for who they are on the inside.
Everybody wants to be loved regardless of where you're from,
or what you look like, or how much money you have,
or you know your class, your background, everyone you know
and if you want a long term relationship, ultimately you
know what you look like when you go into that
relationship is going to change over ten or twenty or
(02:17):
thirty years. So, um, I wanted to have a show
about you know who we are, like I said on
the inside, um So a lot to unpack there, one,
Because you mentioned you have created a lot of these shows,
a lot that are very successful. What percentage of it?
And I keep doing this little pie like what percentage
of it? Was you just brainstorming what hasn't been done?
(02:39):
What what have we not gotten to yet? When it
came to this, think a lot of it, A lot
of it. You know, you want to do something that's
unique in its own being and something that's not derivative.
And then did you kind of find that I don't
know if altruism is the right term, but did you
kind of find something maybe more than just a show
that hadn't been done for just hearing the way you
describe it, you know, it's it's it's very virtuous that
(03:00):
you would want to try to create and build these relationships,
like you know the foundation that is built in this show. Well,
I think the I think the key question of the
show is not um or The key point of view
of the show is not that love is blind. I
think the key question the show is whether love is blind. So, um,
you know, if you start with love and then you
go out into the world, which everyone describes a very
(03:23):
polarized today. Um, there's a lot of judgment, it's a
lot of vitriol and social media. The question is can
love overcome the judgments that people throw at you or
that you create for yourself? Um? And I think it's
fascinating to watch what happens. Gee, I think you can
answer quite a few of those, right, because you went
through it. Yes, I mean I think I discovered love
(03:44):
in so many different ways, right, Um. I experienced love
in many different forms, like love for myself, love for
my family, love for someone else. And I don't know
if you knew that people are going to experience all
these different types of love. I mean, it's the you know,
love is a universal language, right. Um. So did you
think that we were going to go through like this
(04:06):
period of self discovery to get to accepting someone else
into our lives or how do you think that I was.
I don't know about you. I was pretty blown away
by what happened. I thought there was a good chance
that when we went into the pods that people were
going to connect in a way that they didn't. You know,
people describe, um, the experience of finding someone to love
today as being very difficult. You know, there are more
(04:28):
ways than ever to find someone to love. You know,
a lot of technology, a lot of devices, and people
sort of counterintuitive. It's you know, they feel like they're
disposable when they think about how they they find love.
They think that, you know, the way that they're judged
is on a very surface level. Um, they find themselves
(04:50):
judging other people on a very surface level. And so
I thought by taking those devices away and creating an
intimate and comfortable environment that people would feel like they
a connect in a different way. But I I don't
think I ever imagined the success, you know, the Overwelming.
I mean we we didn't. I mean, we ended up
with eight couples that were engaged. I what did you expect? Uh,
(05:12):
you know, I was hoping that we would get a couple,
you know, a couple of engagements. I really had no
idea that we would you know, get as many as
we had, and and you know, ultimately we had so
many that you know, we couldn't follow all of them,
you know, I mean you talked about Rory, We couldn't
we you know, it didn't even follow Rory's engagement. So
when we talked to Rory, we said, you know, why
didn't you make the cutties Like, I don't know. I'm
(05:32):
still trying to answer that question. Maybe you can answer
the question of how did you decide which couples to
take with you and which too to leave behind? Uh,
you know, it was not science. It was just really random, um,
to be honest, I mean we just picked people that
you know, we thought for different reasons, would be complimentary
to you know, the different uh couples to each other
(05:56):
and um, you know kind of just hope to wing
in a prayer And was it did you base any
of it on more likely to say yes? Was it conflict?
What were you? I guess what I'm asking is did
you have something you were looking? Well? I think it
was amazing in that when you know, when the reveals happened,
you know, we thought that so when it reveals being
the first time they saw each other, you know, UM,
(06:17):
I think that we expected that there might be more
um surprised with people who came together, who had fallen
in love and then saw each other for the first time,
people might um, look at one another and not you know,
um to become yeah, be well down. But you know Jessica,
(06:40):
Jessica Wasn't you know Jessica when you watch I that's
what she said, when you when you look at the
show and I when I remember being there for the
reveal and watching Jessica, and it is almost like the
wind is completely sucked out of her body. You know,
she is she it's like and I read that as disappointment, like,
(07:00):
oh my god, not at all, not at all. And
then when you see her and it's so authentic and
so real, and she talks about the the fact that
she fell in love with someone not for how he looked,
and he is her person and and she but even
in that moment, she talks about how there will be
people who have judgment right of their relationship, but she
(07:21):
doesn't care because this is her man. They're going to
live well into the future together as a couple. And
I there's no way that she's putting that on I
feel like she genuinely. And so that was the biggest
surprise to me was that regardless of the differences, she
I read it like she just wanted to go to Mexico.
I was like, you know what, she just wants to know,
she wants this thing to keep going. I don't. I
(07:42):
don't believe that for a second. So obviously, you know,
we were taken out of the pods and then we're
put into Mexico before going back into our work lives
or you know, our social lives. When did you start
seeing the external factors start creeping in two? Because it
happened to me, it happened to Jessica. I think it
happened to have some couple obviously, But when did you
start seeing the external factors start taking a toll on
(08:04):
the relationships? Uh? You know, I think external factors can
either you know, enhance the relationship or they can you know,
it can it can be an impediment. Um. And I
think look, as soon as you see each other, it
comes into play, you know. And I think for different people, Um,
there are different physical factors. You know it It could
(08:25):
be does how I look matter? It could be you know,
as how old I am? Does that matter? You know?
When you go to see you know, where the other
person lives, you know, does that matter? You know, because
because when you're in the pods and you talk about
you know, you might say, Hey, I'm a really neat person,
and you might say I really like a neat person.
(08:47):
But then when you go to see Damien's place and
you're like, this is not what i'd call neats, Like
that says he's really a slob, you know, or whatever,
you know, And I feel like, so so part of
it is that you you're connecting on a on a
really emotional level, um, but you know, your expectations in
(09:08):
the material world might be very different. Yeah, because I
felt like we romanticized so much. And I think we
do it through Tinder, through Hinge, and it's like, oh,
like this person obviously, you know, it looks like a
really stand up guy and has a really great job,
and we romanticize these relationships and then once we start
to actually touch and feel on all these different parts,
it's like, wait, like you're just a normal person. So
(09:30):
I think that's when it started to kind of well,
I think there's a there is a romantic aspect to it,
but I also think it was fascinating to me, you know,
talking to everybody who went through the pods. You know,
every single person that that I've spoken to, whether they
got engaged or not, said it was a completely transformative
experience that it changed their lives forever, absolutely, you know,
(09:51):
and I think people were really honest. And it's one
of the things I'm most proud about this show is
that we you know, we've been really transparent and um,
you know, haven't really away from any subject matter. And
I think, you know, um, the the honesty of of
you know, the experiences that people went in being curious.
That was a sort of a casting that was the
(10:12):
number one casting priority was that we wanted people who
are genuinely interested in finding life partner and and genuinely
curious about getting married. I think it would truly be
impossible by talking to people and you know, by trying
to see if they are by you know, and part
of it's a gut thing, you know, through our casting
team trying to you know, again, coming from doing a
(10:32):
lot of relationship shows, whether people feel genuine or not.
But I think no matter whether you are genuine about
that or not, I think that people felt like, um,
you know, hey, I'm gonna go on into this experience.
It's gonna be fun. I'm gonna meet some cool people,
you know, great. I have no idea really whether I'm
I'm gonna get, you know, whether I'm gonna fall in love,
(10:56):
whether I'm gonna find something I want to propose to,
and the amount of emotion I mean, you you know,
that's the amount of emotion you know by by day three,
day four, day five. You know, Lauren talking to you
in the scene on the show, you know, day two,
she's like, oh, she sees you in the hall and
walks down. All I was like, I'm crying in the
pod with a you know, a guy I just met
(11:17):
a day ago. You know, it's crazy, And I mean,
there was something about that experience that that ended up
having people described their feelings for the person on the
other side of the wall as different than they had
ever felt in their life for people they had dated
for two or three or four or five years, or
for their own family. And clearly, you know, it's a
(11:37):
great success for you. It's the reason why the show
is as successful as it it's been. So what did
you think was good? Like, so let's go through, let's
go step by step one. Why the pods? How did
you come up with that too? What did you think
was going to happen in three? What surprised you up?
So the pods really came you know, came about because
we wanted to create an environment where people would feel
(12:00):
very comfortable to be emotionally intimate, you know. Um, we
wanted to you know, there's no production crew in the
pods that you know, cameras are all hidden, you know,
so people we wanted people to feel just very comfortable
and at home. There were you know, the drinks if
they they wanted to have, you know, multiple different kinds
of drinks or or you know, people could bring food
(12:22):
into the pod. We wanted to feel like there's a
blanket if you know, you wanted to you know, cuttle
up however you wanted to do that. We soundproof the
pods so you couldn't hear what was going on, you know,
in the in the pods next to you, and there's
a little speaker at the front um and there's a
wall and at one point we thought about the wall
um sort of being something that you could you could
(12:45):
genuinely see the shadow of the person like the cross. Yes,
that's right. We thought about doing that and we decided
not to because so we we wanted to because we
didn't want to give any idea of the shape or
or size but eat any of that, nothing like that.
So but the wall ends up moving in a in
a way that some people describe as as sort of hypnotic.
(13:08):
And yeah, and it was like, yeah, it kind of
puts you in a trance. And I mean, coming from
a Catholic background, I was going to say, it's a
confessional man. I was going to say, did you get
like any like religious influence, because when I was in there,
I was just like, alright, let me confess my sins,
which is great. And I think you know, look, everyone
(13:28):
everyone has a has a different experience of being in there,
and and that's the thing. You can really shape the
experience to be your own thing. And but but you know,
having having something that's moving and having the speaker right there,
you know, which is the way that you hear the
person on the other side of the walls through this
little speaker. Um it you know, it directs your attention
to the front of the pot and it makes I
(13:50):
think it makes you feel like there's a living, breathing
being right there in front of you, um, even though
you can't see them and can't touch them, and um,
it's really I think it was really cool. You know what,
what surprised you those first ten days they talked about
Lauren and like, you know, just after a day? Is that?
What it was? Just the immediacy of how quickly it happened. Uh,
(14:13):
not the not the necessarily the immediacy, but just the
depth um of connection that we got, the breadth of connection,
the depth of connection UM and the way that people
described that. You know, people would talk about, oh my god,
you know, I've been single for so long. I have
friends who have been single for so long. They have
horrible luck, and I'm gonna come out of here and
I'm gonna tell them that the way they've gonna they're
(14:34):
gonna find someone is like we we've got to set
them up in a pod and like that's the way
that they're gonna find a person. And you know, um,
and so that was that was really really cool. I think, UM,
just the just the the way that they described their
um experience. They would say, and it's true, they'd say,
(14:55):
you know, you're gonna have hundreds of hours of incredible content,
which is true. We have so much. I mean, we
could have made a twenty hour series just based on
what happened in the pods. Um. There's so much incredible
stuff that we weren't able to show, and um, you know,
I think that it's uh, why not released? Then well,
(15:18):
well you never know what might happen. You never know.
But because I think you're you hit it like as
good as and and we got conflict in Mexico and
that you know, you always want that, and you kind
of then you have sort of the peak, you know,
and and the you know, the the finish of the weddings.
But I think the pods are probably what we're the
most compelling of everything. That's what I think really surprised
me about the show. As those conversations were kind of
(15:41):
I don't know, you almost wanted them to go back
to the pods for a little bit longer because you
felt like you learned more inside of them. I think, Look,
I think every everyone, um has a different favorite part
of their show. I think, you know, there's a lot
of yeah, yeah, what was yours? Uh, you know, I
think the I think the entirety of the journey, Um,
you know, there isn't one part of it that would
be complete without the rest of it. The one episode
(16:03):
that you're like, hey, if I got to submit, this
is the episode I'm sending in no, no, no, I
guess it's true. It's different. It's different exactly. It's uh
like the the infancy, the toddler stage, the teenage years. Yeah.
But you know there again in the Pods, there there
were some you know, there there was And you were
talking to Carlton on a previous episode and and I
do want to get into that because he had quite
(16:25):
a bit to say, but it was interesting. You know,
so Carlton obviously connected with um Diamond, but you know
there's another woman named Brianna he connected with as well. Yeah,
and it was incredible to me, like one of the
one of the great moments, you know, in terms of
the the the depth of emotion in the Pods. Where
was where um? You know, Brianna thought that she was
falling in love with Carlton, and you know, Carlton was
(16:47):
falling in love with Diamond. And you know, Carlton ultimately
had to tell Brianna that that he wasn't you know,
he wasn't going to move forward with her. And she
had probably as close to a panic attack as as
I've ever seen. And she um in one of the
trailers that's up on Netflix. UM, I think it's like
the season Super Teer. I don't know what they call it,
(17:08):
but um, you see a woman from the back, from behind,
and she's she's walking out of the facility, and she's
huffing and panting and saying, what's wrong with me? What's
wrong with me? What's wrong with me? And she can't
she can't catch her breath, and and I I was
right behind her in that moment, and I went out
to talk to her right after that moment. And what
(17:31):
was so moving about that was that she felt, because
of the construct of the pods, that she was being
rejected for who she was interning, which is a horrible
thing to feel what you look like. What happened to
a couple of us, we had all a lot of
people had anxiety attacks. I myself found like two, I think.
(17:51):
And it was at the moment where I was just like,
I remember, I was looking at myself in the mirror
because I couldn't even face myself because I was just like,
I have to go and tell him who I am.
I remember, I was like, you have to face yourself.
And when I did that, I just broke. And I
think that what you're saying is to me you know,
if it's if it's if there's something that ultimately is
really surprising, it's that I think not just that people
(18:14):
fell in love, um, but that people learned as much
about themselves, you know, as much about a journey of
self discovery as it was about a journey of finding
another person. I asked this um to Rory and and
(18:37):
he said, it's the exact opposite. Not that I should
lead you with the answer, but I said, do you
think it's not that you were being your true self?
But you were being yourself in this weird environment that
you had never been dropped into before, and we'll never
be dropped into again, so it's hard to ever be
that person again. Does that make sense at all, that
that you are reacting to your environment as opposed to
(18:59):
maybe covering a different part of yourself that you didn't
know that was there. I think there's a little bit
of both. I mean, I think you're in the environment,
so of course you're you're you know, you're sort of
encouraged and enabled to act in a certain way that
that maybe you know, might be difficult for you to
to do on the outside of that experience. But I
also think that you know, again, whether people follow through energy,
(19:20):
you could probably you know, talk about this, you know,
certainly better than me. Um. A lot of people talked
about feeling as I exited the Pods that that they
were going to be changed in the way that they
looked at people, UM, outside of the Pods, in in
their you know, life in the real world. Yeah. Absolutely,
I mean after going through falling in love with people
(19:42):
in such a weird way, and too, I've obviously fall
in love with Damien, but I and I think you've
heard me say this, I fell in love with everyone
there because there was just so much truth and beauty
and realization and acceptance going on in this special, special place.
And we would always tell each other like, no one
is going to understand this because it was true and
(20:05):
true a social experiment, and it was a place where
we were able to just let every single wall down
and we became each other's confidence and it was just
such a therapeutic thing. I can't even put into words.
I'm glad you said that about you know, nobody understanding that,
because that's the thing that I heard over and over
from from you and from other people. There was that Again,
even if we had made a twenty hour series. The Again,
(20:26):
just the idea of being able to connect in that
way and open up in that way was going to
be impossible to to really translate to an audience. And
then thanks to the question, and I don't know if
you've pat did the idea already, but is there going
to be a series of Chris Cole and pod Meat
centers where people can actually like set up an appointment like, Hey,
(20:48):
I'm gonna come in at eight o'clock and you get
to log in and you just have a number, and
then if you hit it off with someone, you can
set your appointment the following day. Have you thought about
that where you can apply this to general society? You
never know, either I just planted a seed or I
just said something like, really, you're really bringing that up
right now? Already? How early we are into this that
(21:10):
the concrete hasn't even been poured yet. My gosh, um, exactly,
that's right. We could do it with pop ups. Did
you ever think about it was just that when you
mentioned you thought about making it opaque and where you
could maybe see an outline if someone. Did you ever
think about making it a thin enough wall where you
could actually feel the person, even if it was just
like I don't know, a quarter of an inch of
(21:31):
rubber where you can maybe feel the heat from there,
had something like that. We thought a lot about what
the separation would be, and and we thought that you know,
if you could touch them, you know, you could sort
of make out shapes and sizes, and so we decided
to not do that. But to your point, I and
this is at that point where no one will understand
what we went through. But I was able to make
(21:52):
out shapes and sizes just based off of the sixth
sense that I developed, maybe because maybe blind people maybe
can get someone that's blind on here and to talk
about this. But because of the vibrations that I was feeling,
I developed the sixth cents where I was like, he's tall,
he's linky, he has this type of hair, he has
this type of eye color. Because of the vibrations that
I was getting. And that's just it was. I'm telling
(22:15):
it was an experiment, man, And what was your what
was your accuracy rate when you got to see everybody?
How close were you I was? I was right about
the sizes, but I was completely off about skin color,
eye color, Like all the colors were wrong, But I
feel like I got the the the mass of people correct.
So love is color blind, that's what you're telling entirely. Um.
(22:41):
One of the things that we regularly see in a
lot of these are conflict, a lot of conflict, and
it seemed like there was potential for conflict in the
facilities between the girls and the guys because it's fifteen
and fifteen. Was there more you mentioned how many hours
you have, was there more than we saw? Um? And
if there wasn't, were you surprised because obviously you've done
this before, you know, UM, kind of what you can
(23:02):
get out of this in terms of conflict more conflicts.
And then then we saw in the ten episodes, Yeah, no, no,
not in the pods, in the facility between guys with
one another and girls with one another because they're interested
in the same person, you know what. I think that
there was some but actually, in a way, I think
because of the way that people were opening up inside
of the pods, there was actually more bonding between the
(23:24):
women and between the men. I think that. Um. Of course, yes,
there's some rivalry, and sometimes people felt like, I mean,
you saw that on the show, you know, particularly with
regard to Elsie and and Amber, and I think that
you know, um Elsie, you know, an Amber, uh, you know,
felt like they were very different kind of people, and
(23:44):
they they each really wanted you know, Barnett to choose them,
and they both you know, you know, I don't know
that they liked each other that much, but I don't
think that they you know, I think they just chose
to stay away from each other, you know, as much
as they possibly could. Did that surprise It really did
surprise me. Like I had assumed that there was that
(24:04):
moment when Mark and Barnett recognized they were both interested
in Jessica, and it seemed like, you know, there was
something that was brewing and then it just kind of
fell by the wayside. Well, I think, you know, Mark
talks about on the show that he um, you know,
he there's nothing he can do about it. You know,
it's like if ultimately Jessica wants to, you know, go off.
He talks about how his mom said, you know, you
love something, you let it go, and if it comes
(24:26):
back to you, it's yours. And if you don't, you know,
if it doesn't come back, then it's not. And that's
how he felt. Um So I think that he chose
not to get into a conflict. And I think that
you know Barnett, as you have seen, you know, Barnett
was interested in Jessica, but also you know Amber and
also see Yeah, and you know and maybe even some
others you know, Um, But yes, why the decision to
(24:49):
send him to Mexico together to have everybody still be
or is that just for production reasons and that's easier.
Was there something behind that that you still wanted these yeah,
that that you know that you still wanted them to
interact with one another after they selected their fiance, and
you still wanted them to all have that connection with
one another. What was kind of the thought behind that? Well?
(25:10):
Because I think that one of the fascinating things about
this experiment is the idea that they've all dated, right,
I mean you've said that on the on the show.
You know we all dated um and and that's fascinating.
So everyone knew each other really really well, UM, but
didn't know what the others looked like, right, And so
(25:34):
to get an opportunity too And I think look, the
most pronounced um version of this was you know Jessica
and Mark and you know Jessica describing before everyone met.
You know, well, Mark's a little smaller than you know,
maybe the guys I would you know, date and marksa
and and then she saw Barnett And by the way,
(25:57):
going into it, there's no way to know, you know,
who people might be interested or not be interested in.
But then she sees Barnett, and you know, if she
finds Barnett more attractive? Does that matter? It wasn't it
will matter. We didn't go into it saying it will matter.
The question is doesn't matter? Should it matter? If you're
in love with someone and you're engaged to be married
(26:18):
to them, You've chosen to spend your life, You've chosen
them to spend your life with. Should it matter if
you find somebody else more attractive? And you know, maybe
there's no answer to that, and maybe the answer is
different for different people. That's what I think is fascinating
about the show. Did you think that anyone in particular
was going to latch onto the other once they saw
(26:41):
each other in person? I don't think we had any
preconceived notions at all. I think we we really and
truly just wanted to let it unfold in a natural,
organic way. And and you know, and truth is stranger
than fiction, and just you know, we wanted to listen,
let it go. I want to go back to what
you said with with Max to Go because it's interesting
(27:01):
because gee, you said, um that you fell in love
with everyone, and so it's almost like it's it's different,
right than just being in Mexico and I'm at the
pool and hey, there's a super attractive woman that I
physically am attracted to versus, but they have this emotional connection.
So it's it's almost different. It's like it's I don't
(27:22):
want to say it's sinister, but man, that's tough. Like
you have to some degree falling in love and giving
part of yourself to this person, and if you do
find them more physically attractive, you're already in love with
them emotionally, right, Yeah, but it's for me. It was
a very clear cut answer of this is a love
of friendship type of love and this is a romantic
type of love. Um. And so when I saw everyone,
(27:45):
I was just like, Kenny, I know you, like you're
my friend, Like I love you, but like that's it.
But what if it wasn't Kenny, what if it was Travis?
Travis I'm sorry, who was Who's our thirty one year
old version Taylor? Taylor? What if it was I don't
even know his name. I know LMO as the thirty
one year old version. Well, Taylor, I already had I
became more of like his confidante. So I saw myself
(28:08):
already more of like his friend. And then I saw
him in person, and I was like, there's no physical connection.
And I think here's the thing. I think that again,
for different people, there were different experiences. So I think,
you know, for g G and Damien, they were there,
there was more of a you know, direct connection for
them in in the Pods, and you know, less of
(28:28):
a love triangle happening for either one of them in
the same way for Lauren and Cameron, you know, it
was like they were sure they were dating other people,
and you know, but I think they were always drawn
mostly to one another. I think for Jessica that's what
I'm getting. For Barnett, I think that in the pods,
they're their emotional experience. In the Pods, they had a
(28:50):
hard time deciding, you know, who the person. They didn't
they didn't go, wow, I you know it's you, and
I'm you know, zero on you. They bounced around quite
a bit. I guess, yeah, I guess what I'm getting at,
because I've been pretty hard on Jessica the whole the
whole time, I think most people I know exactly, but
I think I guess it. It kind of speaks that
(29:11):
that helped bring some clarity, Like, you know what, that's
totally believable. If Barnett is more her kind of you
know guy physically than Mark, and she fell in love
with both of them, well, then obviously she's going to
not necessarily feel like cheated is probably the wrong word,
but like, wow, yeah, that's that's who I'm supposed to
be with. That's who I fell in love with him.
That's the physical attraction that I that I would have
(29:31):
were able to see him. And again, one of the
things I really love about, you know, the show, and
the the way that our participants, you and g G
and and you know, everyone put themselves out there is
that that scene which comes immediately after um, Jessica has
seen Barnett for the first time outside and they you know,
(29:54):
she and Marco back to their room, and you know,
she is, you know, I think she's completely overwhelmed, and
I think that's very real. You know, I think she's
very um, you know, I I can relate to her
in that situation. I think she's a very relatable person
in that she probably at that point, really for the
(30:16):
first time, she has had a little bit more to
drink than she you know, wants to. But it's understandable
why she would do that. You know, I think it's like,
oh my god, I like, what is going on in
my world? My mind is blown. I mean, we all
coped in completely different ways. Yeah, So we had Carlton on.
(30:44):
Um when you decided and we asked him, you know,
how how much did you kind of being blonged back
and forth whether or not you wanted to do this,
you know, based on your fluidity, your sexuality. UM, how
hard was that and how much did you talk about
that and and putting him on as part of this cast. Well,
he he said that he wanted a wife. He wanted
(31:05):
to be married to a female person. UM, that was
what he was looking for. UM. He did not want
to be with a with a man um And you
know that, you know it's hard to I mean if
somebody is saying that, and you know, you have to
kind of take that at face value and and you
(31:26):
know his UM, so it wasn't really a hard choice
to allow. I mean, I think we want to be
open to anyone who wants to find love based on
who they are on the inside. And and ultimately, UM,
you know what happened with Carlton and and Diamond I
think is you know, it's interesting to see what would
have happened. And Carlton actually revealed, um, what he felt
(31:47):
was his big secret prior to uh, you know that
meeting for the first time. Is there anyone um, because
he had brought it up. He's like, I wasn't producer
coached or pushed or anything like that. Um, is there
any involvement? Like did he when he decided to say
that to the camera versus saying it to Diamond? Do
you remember that? And like how did all of that
come up? How did he come to that conclusion that
he was going to do that that day? Well? I
(32:08):
think it was he was you know, I mean, he
had talked about it in interview. I mean, he talked
about during the pods an interview because he was you know,
he was struggling with it. You know, he felt the
whole you know, premise of being in the pods was
again that you were revealing, you know, all of yourself.
And I think that Diamond certainly felt like you know,
one of the reasons she felt so comfortable and confident,
(32:30):
um about the decision to marry him was that she
felt that she had opened up to him in a
way that no, she had never opened up to another man,
um and you know that uh he had done the
same and that was an incredibly emotional thing for her,
and so um, No, we didn't tell him to say
it or not say And I think, you know, it's
(32:51):
really interesting. You can see his body language, you know,
when he has proposed to her and she's accepted his proposal,
and you can see him struggling there with oh my gosh,
she just said yes, and he's crying and he you
can tell that he's torn. He's conflicted about whether or
(33:13):
not he's going to tell her then and he decides
not to, and he decides that he doesn't want to
do it, you know, until after he sees her, and
then you know, it's interesting, you know, and again we
had no idea what he was gonna but I think
that when they got what, he didn't share it with
with you in the Pods, would you have been fine
with that he shares it with you through the interview
casting and then never like mention of it. I don't
(33:35):
you know, I don't know that he I mean, look,
he never had to share it with anybody at any time.
I mean, he could have gone in a to him.
We were like, you didn't have to do this, And
he could have. He could have lied about everything, you know,
he could have he could have not or you know,
omitted everything. You know, he could have just not ever
brought it up. And you know whether people would have
(33:55):
found out or known, or whether it would have been relevant,
who knows. I mean it was his choice, you know,
too articulately. And I think, look, that's part of the
experience of being in the Pods was, you know, people
opened up in a huge way about their insecurities, you know,
whatever it was that they were insecure about, whether that
was you know, be feeling different, feeling you know, uh,
(34:16):
you know, um, insecure about you know, body or um
you know, emotionally or family or whatever. I think that
you know, it really brought that out of people and
had them examine it. It was such a trickle effect.
I feel I feel like we I don't know if
we ever all we never we never planned to go
in there and say, I'm going to go ahead and
(34:36):
talk about, you know, the worst thing that's ever happened
in my life. But it was so interesting. I think
we kind of all had like hive mind where it
was we we all would cry on the same day,
or we all would be happy on the same day,
And it's just so interesting how we all kind of
just connected in that really like innate level. I don't
know how. I don't know if you while you were
on the other side watching it, You're like, what's going on?
(34:58):
And it's just interesting. What about meeting the families and
and was there any was there any family that surprised you?
Was there anything that that that jumped out? I know,
you know, I think one of the more powerful moments
obviously was Cameron meeting Lauren's dad Um, and and that
was I would assume a very I don't know if
you were there for it, but it certainly seemed like
a very special moment. Was there was there anything that
(35:19):
that you can kind of think back to that that
sticks out? Uh, you know, I think some people know
to me the unpredictability of the meetings is really the
most interesting thing. You know. I think that you know,
you know, sometimes um, you know, you look at Barnett
and Amber. I think Barnett was super nervous about going
(35:40):
to meet you know, her mom and her mom. You know,
she's like, why you want to marry my daughter? But
other than that, it's like, oh my god, this is incredible.
This is the best thing ever, you know, and seemed
more nervous to meet his for her to meet his family,
Like there was something. I think he was nervous on
both ends, you know. Um. And I think that, um,
you know, I think that, you know, some people were
(36:03):
just completely and this is again part of you know,
you start with love. Can love overcome if there are
you know, family obstacles. If her family does say what
are you doing? You know, like like Barnette's brother said
to him, like what are you doing? You know, I
think your family, you know, throughout some some healthy skepticism
about are you sure you know what you want? Yeah?
(36:24):
And and and I think that and whereas you know,
Amber's mom was like, hey, great, let's let's do this,
you know. And and so I think that, um, you
know that to me is the most interesting thing. It's
just that different you know people you know, and Lauren's dad,
you know, I really wanted to you know, in his
own way, you know grill camera. I mean, she had
(36:45):
never introduced any boyfriend ever to her dad, so it
was this was a big moment for her. You know
what about some of the uh the news out there
that they that like Jessica and Mark were forced to
go through with the wedding. And that's why the same
with Kenneth and and um, Kenny and Kelly sorry that
(37:06):
that they knew they weren't going to get engaged, but
had to go through it. Um, nobody had to do anything.
Nobody was forced to do anything. UM. I think that
you can see, um, based on the fact that Diamond
Carlton didn't go through with their you know, to their wedding.
Um that nobody was made to do anything. You know,
(37:26):
Kenny and Kelly don't talk about being forced to do that.
Kenny and Kelly have said, oh, they talked about, you know,
not wanting to go through it. But but I'll take
you'll take those one at a time. So you know, Jessica,
Mark has never said that he was forced to go
through with the wedding. You know, Jessica, I think, look again,
I like Jessica. I think Jessica's a smart person. I
think Jessica is a nice person. I think Jessica's a
(37:48):
real person. I think Jessica has gone through a crazy time,
not only on the in the experiment and not only
having her heart you know, in all different places with
Mark and with Barnett and um, but now seeing the
show play back. I mean, this is a crazy experience because, Ay,
you go through this emotional roller coaster right and then
(38:13):
now and you make mistakes and you do things that
you regret, and now you have to watch it back.
Just imagine you do that, but now imagine you have
to watch it back, but the entire world is also
watching all the mistakes you made. And not only that,
they're they're they're judging you, and they're throwing out, you know,
hate to you. And it's a really hard experience. And
(38:33):
so I think Jessica, I mean when when Jessica and
you see it on the show, when Jessica was in Mexico,
and you know it was after she she saw Barnett,
and I think her head was completely spun around you know,
and she had spent a couple of days there and
she felt and she says it on the show, I
don't think I can do this, and she takes off
(38:55):
her ring. Nobody made her take off her ring. Nobody
made her put her ring back gun. You know, she
decided to. If Jessica had wanted to quit the show
in a way, by the way, that would have been
incredible television. And I would have followed that all the way.
You know, Jessica decided and I am, you know, happy
(39:16):
she did this, because the whole point of this is
it's an experiment. You start with love, you know, you
get engaged and your wedding data set four weeks from then, right,
and you are going to face a lot of obstacles.
The question is, you know, can your love overcome the obstacles?
And I think Jessica, to her credit, said, you know what,
(39:37):
I'm going to give this a shot. And I think
Jessica felt that, you know, she at some point was
going to run into somebody that said this is not
the right relationship for you, whether it was you know,
her friends or his friends or his family, or somebody
was gonna say don't do And every time she'd put
(39:57):
that out there and would be like, yeah, this is amazing,
saying this is great and like, what you know, what
you have to be worried about? And and eventually after
hearing that, and she started to build confidence in herself
and I think and in the relationship so much showed
that they slept together. Nobody made her sleep with Mark,
nobody made them have sex, nobody made her go with
(40:18):
her friends and cheers to being Mrs Quaivas. Nobody. She
does that all on her own. And when you watch
the scene where she's you were there, g G when
she was trying on her wedding dress, and you see
how conflicted she is because she's you know, it's like
is it feel right? Is it not feel right? Is
it feel like? How does that feel like? That's those
are very real feelings. And so I applaud her for
(40:41):
going through with it. And I will tell you being
at her wedding um and and not knowing what was
going to happen. I never knew what was gonna happen
at any of the weddings, by the way, it was
just incredible. Um. And you know, seeing Mark say, I
do I had no idea what she was gonna say
I thought there was a great chance that she might
ultimately go through with it. Did it forgive my ignorance?
(41:02):
Did it always go in the same order? Was it
always guy first girl? Or no? It wasn't because you
said yes, and we'll get to that later. So how
did you decide who was going to I didn't decide anything.
You didn't know, I didn't know. So it was just
sometimes it was the guy, sometimes it was the girl.
That each of the chance, each of them planned their
own you know, that was up to them, which one
(41:22):
was going to be able to say I do or
I don't have to be honest, I'm not in the
weeds of planning the val It's just that some some
started with the guys, some started with the girl, something
like Jessica said, you know what I mean, um, and
then so to Kenny, to the other one, to Kenny,
and so yeah, I think I think Kenny and Kelly again,
I'm not there for every single conversation, and we're not there,
you know, around the clock, and people go and have,
(41:44):
you know, private conversations. I will tell you that, you know,
it is certainly um conceivable that Kenny and Kelly said, hey,
you know what, I'm not sure we want to go
through this right and I'm not sure we want to
do this. And all I will tell you Kenny, the
shots of any like after, well, that's what I'm gonna say.
All I'll tell you is when you watch the actual
(42:05):
footage of that day and you see Kelly's emotion, and
you see Kenny's emotion. And I know for a fact
because I was there and we had conversation, I know
that Kenny would have said I do had Kelly said
I do. I know for a fact. And when you
look at Kelly's sister talking to her, and Kelly's sister
looks like she's watching her. Kelly's sister looks like she's
(42:27):
watching Kelly go through a slow motion crash, you know,
because she's looking at her like, what are you doing?
You're throwing away the best guy you've ever been with.
You are a complete idiot. And and and so you know,
you can say whatever your people again, so many people
have experienced judgment. You can come up with stories to
(42:49):
to you know, revisionist history, to defend yourself and say, oh,
well it was this, oh is that? And all I
can say is we try to tell the honest truth
about their stories and we put it out there and
you know it's as you know, as honest as we
can be. Yeah, But to the extent of having those
emotional bonds created in the pods like with Mark and Jessica,
(43:12):
I felt like that she was constantly reliving that experience
and that's why she was still going on with the experiment.
And then with the fact that Kelly said, no, I mean,
to what extent can we say, Hey, listen, I just
don't feel the chemistry. That's the one thing that I
can't put my finger on it. And I mean, how
do you go about and explain that? So I think
(43:35):
it's just, yeah, she was doing away a great guy.
But at the end of the day, if you don't
feel that like that spark, that chemistry, that thing within
the skin, you know, do you force it? Do you say?
I'm not saying it was the wrong decision. I'm saying
her sister. Her sister was looking at her going, oh
my god, I can't believe you're doing that. Well, all
I'm saying is that I think the feelings and the
(43:57):
emotion there and when when you look at kel after
the wedding saying, you know, his feelings apparently for me
are more than mine are for him. That's a very real,
you know, insight into her mind. I'm not saying that
she made the wrong decision. You don't want to marry
someone because there's pressure on you to do that. That's moronic, right,
(44:19):
what No, I would never want anyone to do that,
to make that kind of decision. But you know, I
think that, I think that the the journey that you
and the other people went on the show was very
real and authentic in terms of the feelings that work.
And you even see that in reunion. I mean you're
talking about a year, you know, almost you know, a
year and a half later, and Kelly is still still
(44:42):
choked up sitting across from you. I mean, talk about
learning something at the reunion? Did you? I mean after
what we saw And I don't want to get too
far ahead, but did you think this, you know that
that she and Damien were going to be in this
room that we're in today, after what you filmed that
day at the wedding? Well, I think that if again,
you watch the you watch the finale, and you you
(45:03):
see what Damien says um and you see what he
says at the Bachelor Party, UM, you know where he
says that he he loves Gig and you know that, UM,
you know he always will love her, and UM, you know,
I think that you know, the again, we had a
ton of um material that we could put in the show,
(45:27):
and we tried to with the material that we chose
to you know, encapsulate people's real feelings. And I think
that his feelings were so strong for you, UM, that Gig,
that UM, That's why we wanted to put that in there,
because I think we felt like um in a in
a very different way than if you looked at it,
Kenny and Kelly, where like that was just that's done,
(45:50):
you know, and it was done and you know, but
but you obviously said I do, and he said, you know,
talked about how much he loved you. And so I
think just based on those feelings alone, as hard and
conflicted and emotional, as as and messy as all of
(46:10):
that was, I think I always believed that you had
such a an incredible bond, and you know, sometimes that
can become explosive, you know, and tempestuous. But I think
that if there was anyone that I believed might actually
you know, UM, continue to try to figure it out
(46:34):
just because there's so there's so much great stuff there.
It was you too, all right, I think we got
it all Um, just real quick, anything you do different,
I know you're probably gonna say no, but is there
anything that you feel like half only I put this in?
Uh no, why not. That's the number one show in
the world. It's worked pretty darn well. Uh congratulations on
(46:55):
the success. So much for sitting with us and answering
some questions. I think we kind of covered it all
the people might want answered. Well. I appreciate you having me.
Thank you so much. Next episode we mentioned it, we
will talk to Damien maybe. Like I said, I think
I'm just gonna get out of here. G I'll let
you take that one. Subscribe to Love Insight on I
Heart Radio or however you get your podcasts.
It's another episode of Love Insight. Love Insight, the podcast
that covers the Love is Blind global phenomenon. I keep
calling it a global phenomenon because everywhere we go it grows.
I mean, it is remarkable. We are at the time
we are recording this podcast, just a couple of weeks,
not even a month removed from its debut, and uh
yet it is still a topic of conversation, one of
(00:29):
the hottest pop culture topics of conversation. Go on the
voice you just heard Giannina Milady Jabelly g Yeah, I
get to call it Gene now, yes you do. And
we have already learned a whole lot. We have had
an extended conversation with Rory, someone who had about three
minutes of air time. We've had an extended conversation with
Carlton uh and obviously we got to hear your backstory
(00:51):
because you are the host of this pod. But right
now we get to have a discussion with the reason
we're here without the big brain of Chris Cool and
we're not sitting here right now. My third dad is
that what you call him your dad? Because I feel
like he created me in a way, or he was
able to open up a side of me in a
way that no one else has been able to. How
(01:11):
often do you hear that, Chris? Never? This is the
first first time. Yeah, but that's stuff you got. You
got thirty children now that you are already I had
four before. Now. Yes, Chris, you are the creator the
I don't even know all the titles I should attach,
producer everything, executive producer, all of those that right? Am
I getting it right? Am I correct? All of those?
(01:33):
How did you come up with it? Um? You know?
I think we wanted to create a show for Netflix. Um.
Netflix is a global platform and we've done a lot
of relationship shows in the past. Um, you know married
at first sight of the show that we do have
done seven year switch Brian prejudice and thinking about what
unites people worldwide. What everyone in the world wants to feel.
(01:55):
It's to be loved for who they are on the inside.
Everybody wants to be loved regardless of where you're from,
or what you look like, or how much money you have,
or you know your class, your background, everyone you know
and if you want a long term relationship, ultimately you
know what you look like when you go into that
relationship is going to change over ten or twenty or
(02:17):
thirty years. So, um, I wanted to have a show
about you know who we are, like I said on
the inside, um So a lot to unpack there, one,
Because you mentioned you have created a lot of these shows,
a lot that are very successful. What percentage of it?
And I keep doing this little pie like what percentage
of it? Was you just brainstorming what hasn't been done?
(02:39):
What what have we not gotten to yet? When it
came to this, think a lot of it, A lot
of it. You know, you want to do something that's
unique in its own being and something that's not derivative.
And then did you kind of find that I don't
know if altruism is the right term, but did you
kind of find something maybe more than just a show
that hadn't been done for just hearing the way you
describe it, you know, it's it's it's very virtuous that
(03:00):
you would want to try to create and build these relationships,
like you know the foundation that is built in this show. Well,
I think the I think the key question of the
show is not um or The key point of view
of the show is not that love is blind. I
think the key question the show is whether love is blind. So, um,
you know, if you start with love and then you
go out into the world, which everyone describes a very
(03:23):
polarized today. Um, there's a lot of judgment, it's a
lot of vitriol and social media. The question is can
love overcome the judgments that people throw at you or
that you create for yourself? Um? And I think it's
fascinating to watch what happens. Gee, I think you can
answer quite a few of those, right, because you went
through it. Yes, I mean I think I discovered love
(03:44):
in so many different ways, right, Um. I experienced love
in many different forms, like love for myself, love for
my family, love for someone else. And I don't know
if you knew that people are going to experience all
these different types of love. I mean, it's the you know,
love is a universal language, right. Um. So did you
think that we were going to go through like this
(04:06):
period of self discovery to get to accepting someone else
into our lives or how do you think that I was.
I don't know about you. I was pretty blown away
by what happened. I thought there was a good chance
that when we went into the pods that people were
going to connect in a way that they didn't. You know,
people describe, um, the experience of finding someone to love
today as being very difficult. You know, there are more
(04:28):
ways than ever to find someone to love. You know,
a lot of technology, a lot of devices, and people
sort of counterintuitive. It's you know, they feel like they're
disposable when they think about how they they find love.
They think that, you know, the way that they're judged
is on a very surface level. Um, they find themselves
(04:50):
judging other people on a very surface level. And so
I thought by taking those devices away and creating an
intimate and comfortable environment that people would feel like they
a connect in a different way. But I I don't
think I ever imagined the success, you know, the Overwelming.
I mean we we didn't. I mean, we ended up
with eight couples that were engaged. I what did you expect? Uh,
(05:12):
you know, I was hoping that we would get a couple,
you know, a couple of engagements. I really had no
idea that we would you know, get as many as
we had, and and you know, ultimately we had so
many that you know, we couldn't follow all of them,
you know, I mean you talked about Rory, We couldn't
we you know, it didn't even follow Rory's engagement. So
when we talked to Rory, we said, you know, why
didn't you make the cutties Like, I don't know. I'm
(05:32):
still trying to answer that question. Maybe you can answer
the question of how did you decide which couples to
take with you and which too to leave behind? Uh,
you know, it was not science. It was just really random, um,
to be honest, I mean we just picked people that
you know, we thought for different reasons, would be complimentary
to you know, the different uh couples to each other
(05:56):
and um, you know kind of just hope to wing
in a prayer And was it did you base any
of it on more likely to say yes? Was it conflict?
What were you? I guess what I'm asking is did
you have something you were looking? Well? I think it
was amazing in that when you know, when the reveals happened,
you know, we thought that so when it reveals being
the first time they saw each other, you know, UM,
(06:17):
I think that we expected that there might be more
um surprised with people who came together, who had fallen
in love and then saw each other for the first time,
people might um, look at one another and not you know,
um to become yeah, be well down. But you know Jessica,
(06:40):
Jessica Wasn't you know Jessica when you watch I that's
what she said, when you when you look at the
show and I when I remember being there for the
reveal and watching Jessica, and it is almost like the
wind is completely sucked out of her body. You know,
she is she it's like and I read that as disappointment, like,
(07:00):
oh my god, not at all, not at all. And
then when you see her and it's so authentic and
so real, and she talks about the the fact that
she fell in love with someone not for how he looked,
and he is her person and and she but even
in that moment, she talks about how there will be
people who have judgment right of their relationship, but she
(07:21):
doesn't care because this is her man. They're going to
live well into the future together as a couple. And
I there's no way that she's putting that on I
feel like she genuinely. And so that was the biggest
surprise to me was that regardless of the differences, she
I read it like she just wanted to go to Mexico.
I was like, you know what, she just wants to know,
she wants this thing to keep going. I don't. I
(07:42):
don't believe that for a second. So obviously, you know,
we were taken out of the pods and then we're
put into Mexico before going back into our work lives
or you know, our social lives. When did you start
seeing the external factors start creeping in two? Because it
happened to me, it happened to Jessica. I think it
happened to have some couple obviously, But when did you
start seeing the external factors start taking a toll on
(08:04):
the relationships? Uh? You know, I think external factors can
either you know, enhance the relationship or they can you know,
it can it can be an impediment. Um. And I
think look, as soon as you see each other, it
comes into play, you know. And I think for different people, Um,
there are different physical factors. You know it It could
(08:25):
be does how I look matter? It could be you know,
as how old I am? Does that matter? You know?
When you go to see you know, where the other
person lives, you know, does that matter? You know, because
because when you're in the pods and you talk about
you know, you might say, Hey, I'm a really neat person,
and you might say I really like a neat person.
(08:47):
But then when you go to see Damien's place and
you're like, this is not what i'd call neats, Like
that says he's really a slob, you know, or whatever,
you know, And I feel like, so so part of
it is that you you're connecting on a on a
really emotional level, um, but you know, your expectations in
(09:08):
the material world might be very different. Yeah, because I
felt like we romanticized so much. And I think we
do it through Tinder, through Hinge, and it's like, oh,
like this person obviously, you know, it looks like a
really stand up guy and has a really great job,
and we romanticize these relationships and then once we start
to actually touch and feel on all these different parts,
it's like, wait, like you're just a normal person. So
(09:30):
I think that's when it started to kind of well,
I think there's a there is a romantic aspect to it,
but I also think it was fascinating to me, you know,
talking to everybody who went through the pods. You know,
every single person that that I've spoken to, whether they
got engaged or not, said it was a completely transformative
experience that it changed their lives forever, absolutely, you know,
(09:51):
and I think people were really honest. And it's one
of the things I'm most proud about this show is
that we you know, we've been really transparent and um,
you know, haven't really away from any subject matter. And
I think, you know, um, the the honesty of of
you know, the experiences that people went in being curious.
That was a sort of a casting that was the
(10:12):
number one casting priority was that we wanted people who
are genuinely interested in finding life partner and and genuinely
curious about getting married. I think it would truly be
impossible by talking to people and you know, by trying
to see if they are by you know, and part
of it's a gut thing, you know, through our casting
team trying to you know, again, coming from doing a
(10:32):
lot of relationship shows, whether people feel genuine or not.
But I think no matter whether you are genuine about
that or not, I think that people felt like, um,
you know, hey, I'm gonna go on into this experience.
It's gonna be fun. I'm gonna meet some cool people,
you know, great. I have no idea really whether I'm
I'm gonna get, you know, whether I'm gonna fall in love,
(10:56):
whether I'm gonna find something I want to propose to,
and the amount of emotion I mean, you you know,
that's the amount of emotion you know by by day three,
day four, day five. You know, Lauren talking to you
in the scene on the show, you know, day two,
she's like, oh, she sees you in the hall and
walks down. All I was like, I'm crying in the
pod with a you know, a guy I just met
(11:17):
a day ago. You know, it's crazy, And I mean,
there was something about that experience that that ended up
having people described their feelings for the person on the
other side of the wall as different than they had
ever felt in their life for people they had dated
for two or three or four or five years, or
for their own family. And clearly, you know, it's a
(11:37):
great success for you. It's the reason why the show
is as successful as it it's been. So what did
you think was good? Like, so let's go through, let's
go step by step one. Why the pods? How did
you come up with that too? What did you think
was going to happen in three? What surprised you up?
So the pods really came you know, came about because
we wanted to create an environment where people would feel
(12:00):
very comfortable to be emotionally intimate, you know. Um, we
wanted to you know, there's no production crew in the
pods that you know, cameras are all hidden, you know,
so people we wanted people to feel just very comfortable
and at home. There were you know, the drinks if
they they wanted to have, you know, multiple different kinds
of drinks or or you know, people could bring food
(12:22):
into the pod. We wanted to feel like there's a
blanket if you know, you wanted to you know, cuttle
up however you wanted to do that. We soundproof the
pods so you couldn't hear what was going on, you know,
in the in the pods next to you, and there's
a little speaker at the front um and there's a
wall and at one point we thought about the wall
um sort of being something that you could you could
(12:45):
genuinely see the shadow of the person like the cross. Yes,
that's right. We thought about doing that and we decided
not to because so we we wanted to because we
didn't want to give any idea of the shape or
or size but eat any of that, nothing like that.
So but the wall ends up moving in a in
a way that some people describe as as sort of hypnotic.
(13:08):
And yeah, and it was like, yeah, it kind of
puts you in a trance. And I mean, coming from
a Catholic background, I was going to say, it's a
confessional man. I was going to say, did you get
like any like religious influence, because when I was in there,
I was just like, alright, let me confess my sins,
which is great. And I think you know, look, everyone
(13:28):
everyone has a has a different experience of being in there,
and and that's the thing. You can really shape the
experience to be your own thing. And but but you know,
having having something that's moving and having the speaker right there,
you know, which is the way that you hear the
person on the other side of the walls through this
little speaker. Um it you know, it directs your attention
to the front of the pot and it makes I
(13:50):
think it makes you feel like there's a living, breathing
being right there in front of you, um, even though
you can't see them and can't touch them, and um,
it's really I think it was really cool. You know what,
what surprised you those first ten days they talked about
Lauren and like, you know, just after a day? Is that?
What it was? Just the immediacy of how quickly it happened. Uh,
(14:13):
not the not the necessarily the immediacy, but just the
depth um of connection that we got, the breadth of connection,
the depth of connection UM and the way that people
described that. You know, people would talk about, oh my god,
you know, I've been single for so long. I have
friends who have been single for so long. They have
horrible luck, and I'm gonna come out of here and
I'm gonna tell them that the way they've gonna they're
(14:34):
gonna find someone is like we we've got to set
them up in a pod and like that's the way
that they're gonna find a person. And you know, um,
and so that was that was really really cool. I think, UM,
just the just the the way that they described their
um experience. They would say, and it's true, they'd say,
(14:55):
you know, you're gonna have hundreds of hours of incredible content,
which is true. We have so much. I mean, we
could have made a twenty hour series just based on
what happened in the pods. Um. There's so much incredible
stuff that we weren't able to show, and um, you know,
I think that it's uh, why not released? Then well,
(15:18):
well you never know what might happen. You never know.
But because I think you're you hit it like as
good as and and we got conflict in Mexico and
that you know, you always want that, and you kind
of then you have sort of the peak, you know,
and and the you know, the the finish of the weddings.
But I think the pods are probably what we're the
most compelling of everything. That's what I think really surprised
me about the show. As those conversations were kind of
(15:41):
I don't know, you almost wanted them to go back
to the pods for a little bit longer because you
felt like you learned more inside of them. I think, Look,
I think every everyone, um has a different favorite part
of their show. I think, you know, there's a lot
of yeah, yeah, what was yours? Uh, you know, I
think the I think the entirety of the journey, Um,
you know, there isn't one part of it that would
be complete without the rest of it. The one episode
(16:03):
that you're like, hey, if I got to submit, this
is the episode I'm sending in no, no, no, I
guess it's true. It's different. It's different exactly. It's uh
like the the infancy, the toddler stage, the teenage years. Yeah.
But you know there again in the Pods, there there
were some you know, there there was And you were
talking to Carlton on a previous episode and and I
do want to get into that because he had quite
(16:25):
a bit to say, but it was interesting. You know,
so Carlton obviously connected with um Diamond, but you know
there's another woman named Brianna he connected with as well. Yeah,
and it was incredible to me, like one of the
one of the great moments, you know, in terms of
the the the depth of emotion in the Pods. Where
was where um? You know, Brianna thought that she was
falling in love with Carlton, and you know, Carlton was
(16:47):
falling in love with Diamond. And you know, Carlton ultimately
had to tell Brianna that that he wasn't you know,
he wasn't going to move forward with her. And she
had probably as close to a panic attack as as
I've ever seen. And she um in one of the
trailers that's up on Netflix. UM, I think it's like
the season Super Teer. I don't know what they call it,
(17:08):
but um, you see a woman from the back, from behind,
and she's she's walking out of the facility, and she's
huffing and panting and saying, what's wrong with me? What's
wrong with me? What's wrong with me? And she can't
she can't catch her breath, and and I I was
right behind her in that moment, and I went out
to talk to her right after that moment. And what
(17:31):
was so moving about that was that she felt, because
of the construct of the pods, that she was being
rejected for who she was interning, which is a horrible
thing to feel what you look like. What happened to
a couple of us, we had all a lot of
people had anxiety attacks. I myself found like two, I think.
(17:51):
And it was at the moment where I was just like,
I remember, I was looking at myself in the mirror
because I couldn't even face myself because I was just like,
I have to go and tell him who I am.
I remember, I was like, you have to face yourself.
And when I did that, I just broke. And I
think that what you're saying is to me you know,
if it's if it's if there's something that ultimately is
really surprising, it's that I think not just that people
(18:14):
fell in love, um, but that people learned as much
about themselves, you know, as much about a journey of
self discovery as it was about a journey of finding
another person. I asked this um to Rory and and
(18:37):
he said, it's the exact opposite. Not that I should
lead you with the answer, but I said, do you
think it's not that you were being your true self?
But you were being yourself in this weird environment that
you had never been dropped into before, and we'll never
be dropped into again, so it's hard to ever be
that person again. Does that make sense at all, that
that you are reacting to your environment as opposed to
(18:59):
maybe covering a different part of yourself that you didn't
know that was there. I think there's a little bit
of both. I mean, I think you're in the environment,
so of course you're you're you know, you're sort of
encouraged and enabled to act in a certain way that
that maybe you know, might be difficult for you to
to do on the outside of that experience. But I
also think that you know, again, whether people follow through energy,
(19:20):
you could probably you know, talk about this, you know,
certainly better than me. Um. A lot of people talked
about feeling as I exited the Pods that that they
were going to be changed in the way that they
looked at people, UM, outside of the Pods, in in
their you know, life in the real world. Yeah. Absolutely,
I mean after going through falling in love with people
(19:42):
in such a weird way, and too, I've obviously fall
in love with Damien, but I and I think you've
heard me say this, I fell in love with everyone
there because there was just so much truth and beauty
and realization and acceptance going on in this special, special place.
And we would always tell each other like, no one
is going to understand this because it was true and
(20:05):
true a social experiment, and it was a place where
we were able to just let every single wall down
and we became each other's confidence and it was just
such a therapeutic thing. I can't even put into words.
I'm glad you said that about you know, nobody understanding that,
because that's the thing that I heard over and over
from from you and from other people. There was that Again,
even if we had made a twenty hour series. The Again,
(20:26):
just the idea of being able to connect in that
way and open up in that way was going to
be impossible to to really translate to an audience. And
then thanks to the question, and I don't know if
you've pat did the idea already, but is there going
to be a series of Chris Cole and pod Meat
centers where people can actually like set up an appointment like, Hey,
(20:48):
I'm gonna come in at eight o'clock and you get
to log in and you just have a number, and
then if you hit it off with someone, you can
set your appointment the following day. Have you thought about
that where you can apply this to general society? You
never know, either I just planted a seed or I
just said something like, really, you're really bringing that up
right now? Already? How early we are into this that
(21:10):
the concrete hasn't even been poured yet. My gosh, um, exactly,
that's right. We could do it with pop ups. Did
you ever think about it was just that when you
mentioned you thought about making it opaque and where you
could maybe see an outline if someone. Did you ever
think about making it a thin enough wall where you
could actually feel the person, even if it was just
like I don't know, a quarter of an inch of
(21:31):
rubber where you can maybe feel the heat from there,
had something like that. We thought a lot about what
the separation would be, and and we thought that you know,
if you could touch them, you know, you could sort
of make out shapes and sizes, and so we decided
to not do that. But to your point, I and
this is at that point where no one will understand
what we went through. But I was able to make
(21:52):
out shapes and sizes just based off of the sixth
sense that I developed, maybe because maybe blind people maybe
can get someone that's blind on here and to talk
about this. But because of the vibrations that I was feeling,
I developed the sixth cents where I was like, he's tall,
he's linky, he has this type of hair, he has
this type of eye color. Because of the vibrations that
I was getting. And that's just it was. I'm telling
(22:15):
it was an experiment, man, And what was your what
was your accuracy rate when you got to see everybody?
How close were you I was? I was right about
the sizes, but I was completely off about skin color,
eye color, Like all the colors were wrong, But I
feel like I got the the the mass of people correct.
So love is color blind, that's what you're telling entirely. Um.
(22:41):
One of the things that we regularly see in a
lot of these are conflict, a lot of conflict, and
it seemed like there was potential for conflict in the
facilities between the girls and the guys because it's fifteen
and fifteen. Was there more you mentioned how many hours
you have, was there more than we saw? Um? And
if there wasn't, were you surprised because obviously you've done
this before, you know, UM, kind of what you can
(23:02):
get out of this in terms of conflict more conflicts.
And then then we saw in the ten episodes, Yeah, no, no,
not in the pods, in the facility between guys with
one another and girls with one another because they're interested
in the same person, you know what. I think that
there was some but actually, in a way, I think
because of the way that people were opening up inside
of the pods, there was actually more bonding between the
(23:24):
women and between the men. I think that. Um. Of course, yes,
there's some rivalry, and sometimes people felt like, I mean,
you saw that on the show, you know, particularly with
regard to Elsie and and Amber, and I think that
you know, um Elsie, you know, an Amber, uh, you know,
felt like they were very different kind of people, and
(23:44):
they they each really wanted you know, Barnett to choose them,
and they both you know, you know, I don't know
that they liked each other that much, but I don't
think that they you know, I think they just chose
to stay away from each other, you know, as much
as they possibly could. Did that surprise It really did
surprise me. Like I had assumed that there was that
(24:04):
moment when Mark and Barnett recognized they were both interested
in Jessica, and it seemed like, you know, there was
something that was brewing and then it just kind of
fell by the wayside. Well, I think, you know, Mark
talks about on the show that he um, you know,
he there's nothing he can do about it. You know,
it's like if ultimately Jessica wants to, you know, go off.
He talks about how his mom said, you know, you
love something, you let it go, and if it comes
(24:26):
back to you, it's yours. And if you don't, you know,
if it doesn't come back, then it's not. And that's
how he felt. Um So I think that he chose
not to get into a conflict. And I think that
you know Barnett, as you have seen, you know, Barnett
was interested in Jessica, but also you know Amber and
also see Yeah, and you know and maybe even some
others you know, Um, But yes, why the decision to
(24:49):
send him to Mexico together to have everybody still be
or is that just for production reasons and that's easier.
Was there something behind that that you still wanted these yeah,
that that you know that you still wanted them to
interact with one another after they selected their fiance, and
you still wanted them to all have that connection with
one another. What was kind of the thought behind that? Well?
(25:10):
Because I think that one of the fascinating things about
this experiment is the idea that they've all dated, right,
I mean you've said that on the on the show.
You know we all dated um and and that's fascinating.
So everyone knew each other really really well, UM, but
didn't know what the others looked like, right, And so
(25:34):
to get an opportunity too And I think look, the
most pronounced um version of this was you know Jessica
and Mark and you know Jessica describing before everyone met.
You know, well, Mark's a little smaller than you know,
maybe the guys I would you know, date and marksa
and and then she saw Barnett And by the way,
(25:57):
going into it, there's no way to know, you know,
who people might be interested or not be interested in.
But then she sees Barnett, and you know, if she
finds Barnett more attractive? Does that matter? It wasn't it
will matter. We didn't go into it saying it will matter.
The question is doesn't matter? Should it matter? If you're
in love with someone and you're engaged to be married
(26:18):
to them, You've chosen to spend your life, You've chosen
them to spend your life with. Should it matter if
you find somebody else more attractive? And you know, maybe
there's no answer to that, and maybe the answer is
different for different people. That's what I think is fascinating
about the show. Did you think that anyone in particular
was going to latch onto the other once they saw
(26:41):
each other in person? I don't think we had any
preconceived notions at all. I think we we really and
truly just wanted to let it unfold in a natural,
organic way. And and you know, and truth is stranger
than fiction, and just you know, we wanted to listen,
let it go. I want to go back to what
you said with with Max to Go because it's interesting
(27:01):
because gee, you said, um that you fell in love
with everyone, and so it's almost like it's it's different,
right than just being in Mexico and I'm at the
pool and hey, there's a super attractive woman that I
physically am attracted to versus, but they have this emotional connection.
So it's it's almost different. It's like it's I don't
(27:22):
want to say it's sinister, but man, that's tough. Like
you have to some degree falling in love and giving
part of yourself to this person, and if you do
find them more physically attractive, you're already in love with
them emotionally, right, Yeah, but it's for me. It was
a very clear cut answer of this is a love
of friendship type of love and this is a romantic
type of love. Um. And so when I saw everyone,
(27:45):
I was just like, Kenny, I know you, like you're
my friend, Like I love you, but like that's it.
But what if it wasn't Kenny, what if it was Travis?
Travis I'm sorry, who was Who's our thirty one year
old version Taylor? Taylor? What if it was I don't
even know his name. I know LMO as the thirty
one year old version. Well, Taylor, I already had I
became more of like his confidante. So I saw myself
(28:08):
already more of like his friend. And then I saw
him in person, and I was like, there's no physical connection.
And I think here's the thing. I think that again,
for different people, there were different experiences. So I think,
you know, for g G and Damien, they were there,
there was more of a you know, direct connection for
them in in the Pods, and you know, less of
(28:28):
a love triangle happening for either one of them in
the same way for Lauren and Cameron, you know, it
was like they were sure they were dating other people,
and you know, but I think they were always drawn
mostly to one another. I think for Jessica that's what
I'm getting. For Barnett, I think that in the pods,
they're their emotional experience. In the Pods, they had a
(28:50):
hard time deciding, you know, who the person. They didn't
they didn't go, wow, I you know it's you, and
I'm you know, zero on you. They bounced around quite
a bit. I guess, yeah, I guess what I'm getting at,
because I've been pretty hard on Jessica the whole the
whole time, I think most people I know exactly, but
I think I guess it. It kind of speaks that
(29:11):
that helped bring some clarity, Like, you know what, that's
totally believable. If Barnett is more her kind of you
know guy physically than Mark, and she fell in love
with both of them, well, then obviously she's going to
not necessarily feel like cheated is probably the wrong word,
but like, wow, yeah, that's that's who I'm supposed to
be with. That's who I fell in love with him.
That's the physical attraction that I that I would have
(29:31):
were able to see him. And again, one of the
things I really love about, you know, the show, and
the the way that our participants, you and g G
and and you know, everyone put themselves out there is
that that scene which comes immediately after um, Jessica has
seen Barnett for the first time outside and they you know,
(29:54):
she and Marco back to their room, and you know,
she is, you know, I think she's completely overwhelmed, and
I think that's very real. You know, I think she's
very um, you know, I I can relate to her
in that situation. I think she's a very relatable person
in that she probably at that point, really for the
(30:16):
first time, she has had a little bit more to
drink than she you know, wants to. But it's understandable
why she would do that. You know, I think it's like,
oh my god, I like, what is going on in
my world? My mind is blown. I mean, we all
coped in completely different ways. Yeah, So we had Carlton on.
(30:44):
Um when you decided and we asked him, you know,
how how much did you kind of being blonged back
and forth whether or not you wanted to do this,
you know, based on your fluidity, your sexuality. UM, how
hard was that and how much did you talk about
that and and putting him on as part of this cast. Well,
he he said that he wanted a wife. He wanted
(31:05):
to be married to a female person. UM, that was
what he was looking for. UM. He did not want
to be with a with a man um And you
know that, you know it's hard to I mean if
somebody is saying that, and you know, you have to
kind of take that at face value and and you
(31:26):
know his UM, so it wasn't really a hard choice
to allow. I mean, I think we want to be
open to anyone who wants to find love based on
who they are on the inside. And and ultimately, UM,
you know what happened with Carlton and and Diamond I
think is you know, it's interesting to see what would
have happened. And Carlton actually revealed, um, what he felt
(31:47):
was his big secret prior to uh, you know that
meeting for the first time. Is there anyone um, because
he had brought it up. He's like, I wasn't producer
coached or pushed or anything like that. Um, is there
any involvement? Like did he when he decided to say
that to the camera versus saying it to Diamond? Do
you remember that? And like how did all of that
come up? How did he come to that conclusion that
he was going to do that that day? Well? I
(32:08):
think it was he was you know, I mean, he
had talked about it in interview. I mean, he talked
about during the pods an interview because he was you know,
he was struggling with it. You know, he felt the
whole you know, premise of being in the pods was
again that you were revealing, you know, all of yourself.
And I think that Diamond certainly felt like you know,
one of the reasons she felt so comfortable and confident,
(32:30):
um about the decision to marry him was that she
felt that she had opened up to him in a
way that no, she had never opened up to another man,
um and you know that uh he had done the
same and that was an incredibly emotional thing for her,
and so um, No, we didn't tell him to say
it or not say And I think, you know, it's
(32:51):
really interesting. You can see his body language, you know,
when he has proposed to her and she's accepted his proposal,
and you can see him struggling there with oh my gosh,
she just said yes, and he's crying and he you
can tell that he's torn. He's conflicted about whether or
(33:13):
not he's going to tell her then and he decides
not to, and he decides that he doesn't want to
do it, you know, until after he sees her, and
then you know, it's interesting, you know, and again we
had no idea what he was gonna but I think
that when they got what, he didn't share it with
with you in the Pods, would you have been fine
with that he shares it with you through the interview
casting and then never like mention of it. I don't
(33:35):
you know, I don't know that he I mean, look,
he never had to share it with anybody at any time.
I mean, he could have gone in a to him.
We were like, you didn't have to do this, And
he could have. He could have lied about everything, you know,
he could have he could have not or you know,
omitted everything. You know, he could have just not ever
brought it up. And you know whether people would have
(33:55):
found out or known, or whether it would have been relevant,
who knows. I mean it was his choice, you know,
too articulately. And I think, look, that's part of the
experience of being in the Pods was, you know, people
opened up in a huge way about their insecurities, you know,
whatever it was that they were insecure about, whether that
was you know, be feeling different, feeling you know, uh,
(34:16):
you know, um, insecure about you know, body or um
you know, emotionally or family or whatever. I think that
you know, it really brought that out of people and
had them examine it. It was such a trickle effect.
I feel I feel like we I don't know if
we ever all we never we never planned to go
in there and say, I'm going to go ahead and
(34:36):
talk about, you know, the worst thing that's ever happened
in my life. But it was so interesting. I think
we kind of all had like hive mind where it
was we we all would cry on the same day,
or we all would be happy on the same day,
And it's just so interesting how we all kind of
just connected in that really like innate level. I don't
know how. I don't know if you while you were
on the other side watching it, You're like, what's going on?
(34:58):
And it's just interesting. What about meeting the families and
and was there any was there any family that surprised you?
Was there anything that that that jumped out? I know,
you know, I think one of the more powerful moments
obviously was Cameron meeting Lauren's dad Um, and and that
was I would assume a very I don't know if
you were there for it, but it certainly seemed like
a very special moment. Was there was there anything that
(35:19):
that you can kind of think back to that that
sticks out? Uh, you know, I think some people know
to me the unpredictability of the meetings is really the
most interesting thing. You know. I think that you know,
you know, sometimes um, you know, you look at Barnett
and Amber. I think Barnett was super nervous about going
(35:40):
to meet you know, her mom and her mom. You know,
she's like, why you want to marry my daughter? But
other than that, it's like, oh my god, this is incredible.
This is the best thing ever, you know, and seemed
more nervous to meet his for her to meet his family,
Like there was something. I think he was nervous on
both ends, you know. Um. And I think that, um,
you know, I think that, you know, some people were
(36:03):
just completely and this is again part of you know,
you start with love. Can love overcome if there are
you know, family obstacles. If her family does say what
are you doing? You know, like like Barnette's brother said
to him, like what are you doing? You know, I
think your family, you know, throughout some some healthy skepticism
about are you sure you know what you want? Yeah?
(36:24):
And and and I think that and whereas you know,
Amber's mom was like, hey, great, let's let's do this,
you know. And and so I think that, um, you
know that to me is the most interesting thing. It's
just that different you know people you know, and Lauren's dad,
you know, I really wanted to you know, in his
own way, you know grill camera. I mean, she had
(36:45):
never introduced any boyfriend ever to her dad, so it
was this was a big moment for her. You know
what about some of the uh the news out there
that they that like Jessica and Mark were forced to
go through with the wedding. And that's why the same
with Kenneth and and um, Kenny and Kelly sorry that
(37:06):
that they knew they weren't going to get engaged, but
had to go through it. Um, nobody had to do anything.
Nobody was forced to do anything. UM. I think that
you can see, um, based on the fact that Diamond
Carlton didn't go through with their you know, to their wedding.
Um that nobody was made to do anything. You know,
(37:26):
Kenny and Kelly don't talk about being forced to do that.
Kenny and Kelly have said, oh, they talked about, you know,
not wanting to go through it. But but I'll take
you'll take those one at a time. So you know, Jessica,
Mark has never said that he was forced to go
through with the wedding. You know, Jessica, I think, look again,
I like Jessica. I think Jessica's a smart person. I
think Jessica is a nice person. I think Jessica's a
(37:48):
real person. I think Jessica has gone through a crazy time,
not only on the in the experiment and not only
having her heart you know, in all different places with
Mark and with Barnett and um, but now seeing the
show play back. I mean, this is a crazy experience because, Ay,
you go through this emotional roller coaster right and then
(38:13):
now and you make mistakes and you do things that
you regret, and now you have to watch it back.
Just imagine you do that, but now imagine you have
to watch it back, but the entire world is also
watching all the mistakes you made. And not only that,
they're they're they're judging you, and they're throwing out, you know,
hate to you. And it's a really hard experience. And
(38:33):
so I think Jessica, I mean when when Jessica and
you see it on the show, when Jessica was in Mexico,
and you know it was after she she saw Barnett,
and I think her head was completely spun around you know,
and she had spent a couple of days there and
she felt and she says it on the show, I
don't think I can do this, and she takes off
(38:55):
her ring. Nobody made her take off her ring. Nobody
made her put her ring back gun. You know, she
decided to. If Jessica had wanted to quit the show
in a way, by the way, that would have been
incredible television. And I would have followed that all the way.
You know, Jessica decided and I am, you know, happy
(39:16):
she did this, because the whole point of this is
it's an experiment. You start with love, you know, you
get engaged and your wedding data set four weeks from then, right,
and you are going to face a lot of obstacles.
The question is, you know, can your love overcome the obstacles?
And I think Jessica, to her credit, said, you know what,
(39:37):
I'm going to give this a shot. And I think
Jessica felt that, you know, she at some point was
going to run into somebody that said this is not
the right relationship for you, whether it was you know,
her friends or his friends or his family, or somebody
was gonna say don't do And every time she'd put
(39:57):
that out there and would be like, yeah, this is amazing,
saying this is great and like, what you know, what
you have to be worried about? And and eventually after
hearing that, and she started to build confidence in herself
and I think and in the relationship so much showed
that they slept together. Nobody made her sleep with Mark,
nobody made them have sex, nobody made her go with
(40:18):
her friends and cheers to being Mrs Quaivas. Nobody. She
does that all on her own. And when you watch
the scene where she's you were there, g G when
she was trying on her wedding dress, and you see
how conflicted she is because she's you know, it's like
is it feel right? Is it not feel right? Is
it feel like? How does that feel like? That's those
are very real feelings. And so I applaud her for
(40:41):
going through with it. And I will tell you being
at her wedding um and and not knowing what was
going to happen. I never knew what was gonna happen
at any of the weddings, by the way, it was
just incredible. Um. And you know, seeing Mark say, I
do I had no idea what she was gonna say
I thought there was a great chance that she might
ultimately go through with it. Did it forgive my ignorance?
(41:02):
Did it always go in the same order? Was it
always guy first girl? Or no? It wasn't because you
said yes, and we'll get to that later. So how
did you decide who was going to I didn't decide anything.
You didn't know, I didn't know. So it was just
sometimes it was the guy, sometimes it was the girl.
That each of the chance, each of them planned their
own you know, that was up to them, which one
(41:22):
was going to be able to say I do or
I don't have to be honest, I'm not in the
weeds of planning the val It's just that some some
started with the guys, some started with the girl, something
like Jessica said, you know what I mean, um, and
then so to Kenny, to the other one, to Kenny,
and so yeah, I think I think Kenny and Kelly again,
I'm not there for every single conversation, and we're not there,
you know, around the clock, and people go and have,
(41:44):
you know, private conversations. I will tell you that, you know,
it is certainly um conceivable that Kenny and Kelly said, hey,
you know what, I'm not sure we want to go
through this right and I'm not sure we want to
do this. And all I will tell you Kenny, the
shots of any like after, well, that's what I'm gonna say.
All I'll tell you is when you watch the actual
(42:05):
footage of that day and you see Kelly's emotion, and
you see Kenny's emotion. And I know for a fact
because I was there and we had conversation, I know
that Kenny would have said I do had Kelly said
I do. I know for a fact. And when you
look at Kelly's sister talking to her, and Kelly's sister
looks like she's watching her. Kelly's sister looks like she's
(42:27):
watching Kelly go through a slow motion crash, you know,
because she's looking at her like, what are you doing?
You're throwing away the best guy you've ever been with.
You are a complete idiot. And and and so you know,
you can say whatever your people again, so many people
have experienced judgment. You can come up with stories to
(42:49):
to you know, revisionist history, to defend yourself and say, oh,
well it was this, oh is that? And all I
can say is we try to tell the honest truth
about their stories and we put it out there and
you know it's as you know, as honest as we
can be. Yeah, But to the extent of having those
emotional bonds created in the pods like with Mark and Jessica,
(43:12):
I felt like that she was constantly reliving that experience
and that's why she was still going on with the experiment.
And then with the fact that Kelly said, no, I mean,
to what extent can we say, Hey, listen, I just
don't feel the chemistry. That's the one thing that I
can't put my finger on it. And I mean, how
do you go about and explain that? So I think
(43:35):
it's just, yeah, she was doing away a great guy.
But at the end of the day, if you don't
feel that like that spark, that chemistry, that thing within
the skin, you know, do you force it? Do you say?
I'm not saying it was the wrong decision. I'm saying
her sister. Her sister was looking at her going, oh
my god, I can't believe you're doing that. Well, all
I'm saying is that I think the feelings and the
(43:57):
emotion there and when when you look at kel after
the wedding saying, you know, his feelings apparently for me
are more than mine are for him. That's a very real,
you know, insight into her mind. I'm not saying that
she made the wrong decision. You don't want to marry
someone because there's pressure on you to do that. That's moronic, right,
(44:19):
what No, I would never want anyone to do that,
to make that kind of decision. But you know, I
think that, I think that the the journey that you
and the other people went on the show was very
real and authentic in terms of the feelings that work.
And you even see that in reunion. I mean you're
talking about a year, you know, almost you know, a
year and a half later, and Kelly is still still
(44:42):
choked up sitting across from you. I mean, talk about
learning something at the reunion? Did you? I mean after
what we saw And I don't want to get too
far ahead, but did you think this, you know that
that she and Damien were going to be in this
room that we're in today, after what you filmed that
day at the wedding? Well, I think that if again,
you watch the you watch the finale, and you you
(45:03):
see what Damien says um and you see what he
says at the Bachelor Party, UM, you know where he
says that he he loves Gig and you know that, UM,
you know he always will love her, and UM, you know,
I think that you know, the again, we had a
ton of um material that we could put in the show,
(45:27):
and we tried to with the material that we chose
to you know, encapsulate people's real feelings. And I think
that his feelings were so strong for you, UM, that Gig,
that UM, That's why we wanted to put that in there,
because I think we felt like um in a in
a very different way than if you looked at it,
Kenny and Kelly, where like that was just that's done,
(45:50):
you know, and it was done and you know, but
but you obviously said I do, and he said, you know,
talked about how much he loved you. And so I
think just based on those feelings alone, as hard and
conflicted and emotional, as as and messy as all of
(46:10):
that was, I think I always believed that you had
such a an incredible bond, and you know, sometimes that
can become explosive, you know, and tempestuous. But I think
that if there was anyone that I believed might actually
you know, UM, continue to try to figure it out
(46:34):
just because there's so there's so much great stuff there.
It was you too, all right, I think we got
it all Um, just real quick, anything you do different,
I know you're probably gonna say no, but is there
anything that you feel like half only I put this in?
Uh no, why not. That's the number one show in
the world. It's worked pretty darn well. Uh congratulations on
(46:55):
the success. So much for sitting with us and answering
some questions. I think we kind of covered it all
the people might want answered. Well. I appreciate you having me.
Thank you so much. Next episode we mentioned it, we
will talk to Damien maybe. Like I said, I think
I'm just gonna get out of here. G I'll let
you take that one. Subscribe to Love Insight on I
Heart Radio or however you get your podcasts.
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.