JapMo

Your comment is interesting in that I think the exact opposite. I would not be surprised if Kelly/Judy told several veterans through the years do not embarrass yourself by trying out again or you will be cut. Retire gracefully and keep your dignity. Fans get tired of seeing the same people all the time. And they also get tired of seeing the same routine. I know it's their signature, but is anyone else tired of seeing that one where they pound the grass and do the kickline? The name is on the tip of my tongue but I can't remember. Anyway, I'd like that to be retired and be replaced by something new and fresh.

IF you had to cut one veteran based solely on everything BUT dancing ability (looks, personality, how they "pop" in front of an audience) I would cut one of the following: Tess, Amber, Madeline (not Maddie) or Alanna. To me they are practically interchangeable in looks. And as far as personality/pop, none put out any more or less than the others. I don't know what it is about some of the brunettes that are currently on the team, but I find most of them incredibly boring to watch. Just my opinion of course, and remember that I didn't base my opinions on their dancing ability.

Sorry I was thinking I was on the Small Talk thread, as I keep going back n forth. Sorry everyone. I’m bored with it myself. I'm guilty too.

Can't tell you how many people have suggested that, but Procrastination is my middle name. One day.....🙂

That's cool, Lennie. Was that with Art Fleming? He was on a local radio station for years and always said the standards were much higher when he was emceeing the show, and anyone who tried out had to really be smart.

When you appeared on Rachel Ray as an audience guest, did they pay you for that, or were you just stopped by someone on the show standing outside trying to get people to come in? Years ago on my husband and my first trip to California, a nice person stopped us on the street in L.A. and asked if we wanted to be in the audience for the game show Concentration (I know some of you remember that). We thought OK, cool. Little did we know they were taping like 5 shows and we could not leave. We were stuck there, and OMG all they wanted us to do was clap the entire time. My hands were red from all the clapping, and we wasted almost a whole day of our vacation being locked in a soundstage. Congratulations. Hope you have something cool planned to celebrate.

I don't think I actually ever really believed we would ever get selected, since the odds were so astronomical, so I went into the auditions just thinking it would be cool to play against other people and see how I did. I worked in Human Resources for 20 years from a company I just retired from, and my department was just 4 women. The Culture Dept wanted to tape us talking about what we did in our jobs, to sort of identify the face behind the voice since 99% of our job was talking to active and retired employees with problems they were having with their benefits. They wanted me to explain on camera the rules of our tuition reimbursement program...just talk naturally and no big deal. I was terrible. Just awful. I'd get 99% finished with my speech and flub it. They rerecorded 4 times, and then finally said take a break and we'll return in a few days to do it again. They never came back, LOL. They scrapped the whole idea. I appeared on national TV but couldn't manage to complete a tiny video that was only going to be seen by the employees of the company.

In 1984, I was a contestant on Wheel of Fortune. They repeatedly said they were looking for average, ordinary people that the viewers could relate to. They announced on the air that they were looking for contestants in my town because they were getting great ratings there. I mean everybody watched it. There was a number you had to call to reserve a spot at their audition, and my husband called it over and over for 5 days before he finally got us both a spot. It turned out to be my birthday. We were in a big room of about 50 people, and the first "test" was a written test where you filled in puzzles like on the show. We made it through that round, and it turned out to be a series of 5 or 6 eliminations and we kept making the cut. During a break I look up and my husband is sitting across the room. I go over and ask him what's the deal, and he says he thought we would have a better chance if they didn't realize we were related. I'm like 'fine, sit by yourself then'. But in hindsight, he was correct. Out of......get this.......5,000 people they auditioned over a 2 day period, they picked 35 people to be on the show. We both got selected. They told us later that they didn't realize until the final cuts that we were husband and wife. I always told everyone they wanted the most bland, boring people and who's more boring and bland than us, LOL. I think they want you to be very outgoing and rah rah on Price is Right, but on Wheel they wanted people who could relate to the audience, AND were not just from California. I got these questions many times from people so I'll answer them right now: No, the show did not pay our way to California. They were VERY emphatic if you wanted to be on their show you it would be on your dime. That board with the letters......it's on wheels. When they first reveal the puzzle, the 3 contestants have to turn their backs and a second or so before the show starts taping, Vanna holds on for dear life as they push that board onto the set. They don't have it sitting out earlier because they don't want the contestants to start trying to figure out the puzzle in advance. They tape 5 shows in one day and usually film 3-4 days a month. So that's pretty much all they work, though I'm sure the crew works for different shows too. Though my husband and I auditioned on the same day, he taped 3 days before me. They tape around 4 PM but the contestants have to be at the studio by 10 AM so they can go over the rules, let you tour the set, and see what you brought to wear for the show. You had to bring 2 outfits...no stripes or plaids because they dance around too much on camera. Only Vanna can wear all white or all black. I wore pearls and the sound guy came over and said 'what the hell is that noise?' The necklace was clanking against the microphone. I had to take it off. My husband was on the show first, so he tipped me off to concentrate on the puzzle when it wasn't my turn. Hubby solved a big puzzle and went to the bonus round, but picked an "A" for the vowel instead of an "E". Puzzle turned out to be "Say Cheese". But I wasn't upset. He won a lot of cool prizes and he looked so relaxed and handsome. They called me from the audience and I stood right off camera range. If he solved the bonus puzzle I could run up and hug him; otherwise just stay behind the camera. The wheel is really hard to turn. They made everyone practice a few times to make sure they could get it all the way around on one spin. I couldn't get enough oomph into it, so they had me stand on a box. In the morning on tape day, you had to pull out a number between 1-5 out of a bag. There were 3 of the same number in the bag, representing 3 contestants per show. My husband picked #2, so he was assigned to the second show. I picked #5 so I was going to be on the last show. If you picked #3 or higher, you got to each lunch with Pat & Vanna. Well, they ate across the room from us peons but it was still exciting. My husband was on show #2 so no free lunch for him. This is what the show's producers repeatedly tell you from 10AM to 4PM of tape day........just because you got a letter from us inviting you on the show and just because you spent a lot of money to come to California and told all your family and friends, if you get stagefright, feel queasy, or feel like you are going to throw up, we will pull you from the show. This scared the crap out of everybody because yeah....we all did spend a lot of money and took vacation from work and all our friends and family were rooting us on and we didn't want to look like idiots. In fact, that was the common thread among all the other contestants I talked to (and all of them are extremely friendly and excited). They didn't care how much or little they won, they just wanted to solve a puzzle. But the biggest thing I heard......no one wanted to look like an idiot on TV. I told myself if I could just get through the first part of having to say a little bit of stuff about myself to Pat, then I would be OK. But the theme music started up, and I'm listening to the other contestants talk to him, I started breathing really heavy and thinking....40 million people are going to see you. This never happened to me before or since, but from the tips of my toes I could feel heat rising up, and it went all the way up to the top of my head. I felt like my face was on fire but Pat started talking to me and somehow I said I was married and had 3 children and blah blah blah and it was over. The game started. You have about 5 inches to move either way. The camera is really close...like 3 feet from your face. And there's a guy with a sign directly under the camera that says SMILE. With all that plus having to smile and make sure you clapped and rooted for the other contestants, it's a wonder anyone can remember to concentrate on the puzzle. And I kept getting Lose a Turn and Bankrupt, even though I didn't get a chance to even pick a letter. First puzzle was solved by Bob, a really nice guy from Ohio. I had no clue what it was. The second puzzle was a big one, and the answer jumped out at me really fast. I kept counting the letters to make sure I was correct about it. I was so scared my competitors were going to solve it before me, but thankfully they were clueless. When it came to me, I spun about 4 times, called out 4 correct letters, and then the 5th time it looked like it was going to go on Bankrupt. You can actually hear me on tape squeaking "no, no, no", LOL. But it barely got on to $400 and I called out a letter and then said I want to solve it. Pat seemed a little surprised, but I did not want to take the chance of continuing on since I was already on friendly terms with Bankrupt and Lose a Turn. I won $2500 in prizes, which put me in the lead for the Bonus Round, but the guy from Ohio guessed the last puzzle which put him over the top with a whopping $3,000. The contestant from California didn't win anything. Bob didn't solve the bonus puzzle, which I didn't figure out either, so our show was the lowest as far as money/prizes won out of the entire 5 shows. Because my husband went to the Bonus Round, he was ineligible for those wonderful "parting gifts". But I was entitled to them, and for about 2 weeks it was Christmas every day. The postman brought a case of Rice-a-Roni, Sherwin Williams paint, Maybelline makeup, and I can't remember the rest. The prizes I won were delivered over the course of about a month. We both became celebrities for about 2 months after the show aired. I gotta say it was kind of cool to have people yelll "I saw you on Wheel of Fortune". I still have the tape we made when our shows aired. Yeah, it's a VCR tape...that's how long ago it was. My husband passed away 16 years ago next month. My kids and I dust it off and watch it every Christmas along with old VCR tapes of Christmases when they were little (one of the prizes my husband won was a camcorder. It was huge, but we taped about 6 or 7 Christmases and it's still fun to watch, even though my son gripes every time about having to get the VCR out of storage to play them).

The show always refers to the fact arranged marriages were common 150-200 years ago and they worked. What they don't say is most of the time it was the parents putting the couple together, and there was no saying no.....you did what your father and mother told you to do, whether you liked it or not. And people were less educated and less sophisticated. Most women didn't work outside the home so they didn't have a frame of reference of what their peers were doing. But you are right...it's a crapshoot. I know the experts are sincere and really want to match people who have a lot of things in common, but they lost all credibility with me when maybe in the second season they began picking people that were complete opposites in the hopes one of them would boost the other up or calm the other person down or bring someone out of their shell, and this was not just unsuccessful but a tragedy for the hopeful people who really wanted to get married. For a while they stopped doing that, but I can unequivocally say they are back at it this season with Christina and Henry. Never have two people had less in common.....OK, maybe Lisa Marie Pressley and Michael Jackson, and that ain't even true because they at least had the Elvis worship going on.

I think Karen really regrets not sticking with her initial feelings about Miles when she saw his Facebook page and tell the producers she didn't want to go through with it. Now she's stuck, and her frustrations are getting harder to hide. I feel sorry for her because she knows Miles is a great guy............for someone else. She is not attracted to him at all, and she knew it for sure when she met him on the altar. Unless in the next 2 weeks or whenever D-Day is she comes to some realization that he's someone she could learn to love, her best option is to end the marriage, do some serious reflection of what kind of guy really attracts her and why, and then try to find that person.

If you mean Dave & Amber, I liked Dave too. But Dave was done early on IMO by Amber's histrionics and would have pulled the plug sooner if he could have. Olivia is going to find out when all the shows finally air that a lot of people think her whining and complaining and finding fault was a serious factor in the marriage breaking up. I think the cats give this couple just enough of an edge that they are not THE WORST COUPLE THE EXPERTS MATCHED THIS SEASON. Maybe just second worst.

See, I made the effort to try to get past that and give him the benefit of the doubt that he wasn't a total jerk because of that one incident and maybe not write him off from the get go. God knows the show has been trying to sway everyone's opinions against him. Brett was sarcastic and many times dismissive and abrupt, but he to this day has not said anything bad about Olivia and has tried to protect her (and himself) from the not-very-hidden-agenda that the show has that if there isn't any dirt to dig up, they will manufacture some. Olivia on the other hand complained, whined, and psychoanalyzed their marriage to death, and constantly see's herself as Little Red Riding Hood and Brett the Big Bad Wolf. Olivia was more than capable to dealing with Brett's sarcasm and getting him to stop being such an ass and maybe they could have had a chance, but not when they were diametrically opposed on the subject of children. And where to live. And how to budget and how much to spend on entertainment and travel.

I don't think Olivia realized until she was already married how important it was to her to continue to live where she does. She didn't even think about that.....she just assumed that her new spouse would automatically want to move in with her. She also probably didn't put any conditions on the financial situation of said spouse. Instead of lower income Brett, she could have just as easily been set up with someone who made a higher income but had children and had to provide for them, which even with a comparable salary as hers wouldn't be able to travel as much as she wants. And of course major major major.....she talked herself into checking the box "Not Opposed" when the questionnaire asked about her interest in having children. Olivia did what I think a lot of MAFS candidates do....in order to be compatible with as many people as possible and thus increase her chances of being matched, she cast her "net" out as wide as she possibly could. That means keeping her dealbreakers down to a minimum. And she knew if she put down she didn't want children she would be narrowing her chances considerably. She didn't lie exactly.....she kind of talked herself into agreeing to maybe have children someday. Likewise she didn't put restrictions on where she wanted to live or what income level a spouse should have. As far as the travel thing I'm sure she emphasized how she really liked to travel, but those type of questionnaires probably don't go into that category that much. I mean, who doesn't want to travel? Everybody checks "Yes" when it asks Do You Like to Travel? They don't ask How Many Times a Year? It was up to Olivia to convey to the experts exactly how important traveling is to her, and considering they matched her with Brett, if she did tell them they didn't listen.

Even though being cat owners might be the only reason they were matched, I still think the experts put waaayyyy more thought into Brett & Olivia than anything they did with Christina & Henry. I mean, I can't see any reason they matched those two. Christina is very social but insecure and needy, so they pair her up with someone extremely shy who barely communicates and has problems initiating any kind of intimacy. Way to go, experts.

I'm sad that they are getting a divorce and she looked so dejected once he left the apartment. Nobody else may believe it, but I really do think Brett was attracted to her and she to him. However, after thinking about their main issues, I came to the realization that Brett was stuck because he really can't compromise on too many things. Yes, you read that right. I'm trying to be as fair as possible. In order for them to have even tried to make it work, Olivia would have to be the one to make most of the changes in her behavior/lifestyle. Problem 1 - Children. That's easy...there's no compromise on children. He wants them and despite what she's said, she doesn't. I'd stop right there because that's a dealbreaker, but indulge me. Problem 2 - Living Arrangements. Brett owns a home. Not sure how much equity he has in it, but it would be silly of him to sell it just because Olivia gets the heebie-jeebies and red marks all over her neck whenever she sets foot in the place. He could rent it out, but we don't know what condition it's in or what his payments are. The going rate for rent might not cover or just barely cover his monthly mortgage. So for the most part there's no real flexibility on living arrangements. Problem 3 - Salary/Lifestyle. Finally there's the difference in salary, and it's a doozy. From what was inferred, I'm going to take a wild guess and say Olivia makes $105,000-$115,000/year, while I believe Brett tops out between $55,000-$65000. Olivia has made it crystal clear she wants to travel.......frequently. And she wants all the trapping that entails...fancy hotels, expensive restaurants. She works hard, makes good money and deserves to pamper herself. Nothing wrong with that, except a big part of why she wanted to get married was to travel with her spouse and see the world together. Even if Brett wanted to, his budget could never match Olivia's expectations. And she's not willing to share her money with him so he could be her traveling companion. Unless Olivia is willing to make all the compromises (have children, live in his home, and supplement Brett's salary for travel time), I see no other solution for them than where they are headed right now...Splitsville.

I wonder if there really wasn't any food left in the pantry after Brett vacated the apartment, like Olivia said. If you've ever had kids, how many times do they hang on to the refrigerator door and proclaim 'there's NOTHING to eat' when they're staring at cheese, bread, salad fixins, etc. As far as the pantry, there's plenty of things........they just have to be made in most cases (Kraft boxed spaghetti, soup, cans of tuna fish, Jello instant pudding). I had a friend who had been unemployed for 10 months and was to the point of selling blood (she was no loser....her company shut down and try as she might she couldn't get hired anywhere, though of course when she finally did get hired she had 2 job offers in the same week). Anyway, she decided she wasn't going to purchase food until there was absolutely nothing left to eat in her pantry. She lasted almost 2 weeks. The final thing was a can of boiled potatoes...yech....but by God she ate 'em. I've often wondered how long I could last.....I do have a lot of stuff crowded in my cupboard.

ChristinA would deserve him walking out, but as much as I like Henry I do agree he doesn't have the strength to 'be the bad guy' (or good guy in this case) & end it. He could do it classier then Brett but he's just not up to it - maybe he can get his bff girl to do it for him. 😏 I saw something last night that kind of surprised me. Mr. Perfect Henry was a little snide, a little nasty and mean. Also, he was twitching a lot when he was talking to Pastor Cal. Maybe because he was this close to being honest with Cal and saying what we all know: I HAVE NEVER LIKED CHRISTINA AND CAN'T WAIT TO GET OUT OF THIS MARRIAGE. But as posters have said previously, he didn't have the courage (say what you want of Brett but he knew it was never going to work and had the guts to end it). I know most people blame Christina and she does have a lot of hang-ups. But her living arrangements at the time they got married should have been discussed. When Henry realized early on that there was something not quite right about where/how she was living pre-wedding, he should have questioned her about it. But he never did. Like he failed to mention to her but never had a problem telling Amani that he thought Christina was rude to production. Christina doesn't find this out until several weeks into the marriage. Now after 10 weeks he tells Pastor Cal that she's been "dishonest". The dishonest one is you, Henry. Again, Christina has too many hang-ups to go in to in just one post, but IMO at least she's tried. Henry has NEVER tried. EVER. He took one look at her and he was done. I have contempt for Henry because he's a liar. His reasons for getting into this in the first place is because one or several "friends" talked him into it. Can anybody on this board honestly see Henry ever even watching MAFS much less deciding that marrying a stranger was something he should do? The man who by his own admission has a lot of problems even speaking to women and needs a LOT of time to get to know someone before even holding their hand much less be intimate? Speaking of his friends, I have no respect whatsoever for Henry when he mentioned while talking to Christina last night that several of his friends had mentioned red flags about her job and her living arrangements. I'm sure they also gave him an earful about Christina being rude right before the wedding. He's probably seen her frustrated and snippy to the crew throughout the filming, but instead of giving Christina the benefit of the doubt that part of her behavior might have been pre-wedding jitters and fear of having a camera in her face all the time, he's used the rude angle against her from the get-go, making no attempt to ever address it with her and continuing to hold it against her from day one to the present. Again, IMO he's been extremely dishonest in this whole relationship, if you want to call it that. Constantly making excuses that he needs more time and he's slow to warm up to intimacy. Whatever. He never gave Christina a chance. Even though they still would have been incompatible, he didn't even try. Again, she's no prize either, but you can't say she hasn't tried. Whew, didn't mean to make this so long. One more thing since I'm already on a roll..................did COVID mess up something with Dr. Pepper's skills as a relationship expert? She gave absolutely zero good advice to Christina. Hold Henry's hand when you talk to him? Hey Dr. P....they're way beyond anything like that helping them. Pastor Cal wasn't great but he was miles ahead of Dr. Pepper.

PLEASE don't compare Brett with Luke. From the wedding night when Kate was too tired to take a shower, Luke was constantly making snide comments on TH about her hygiene, culminating in his very calculated attempt to make the audience think she was a very heavy drinker. Brett is nothing like Luke. I've watched since Day 1 and Luke is by far the worst person they've ever chosen to be on the show. A truly horrible human being. I actually thought Nick and Sonia had a chance until he broke down and told her in a pretty despicable way that he didn't find her attractive. I thought that was awful then, but now I think that's what Henry should say to Christina. You know, get it out in the open, rip off the bandage, get the blood flowing and allow the wound to heal.

They were just playing around. Pulling her onto his lap and asking her to kiss him is being affectionate. Couples do that all the time. She actually seemed to like it, and for once looked happy.

Just what a man loves. She has that sad look on her face, always questioning him about “feelings”, deep conversations, whining, etc. Like that’s going to make him care for her. For someone that won't shut up about feelings and analyzing everything their partner says or does, Olivia could not verbalize what her problem(s) is/are with Brett. I waited...watched the constipated look on her face while she thought about it....and then...nothing. She likes the guy off camera but not the one on camera. And that's a bad thing why? The cameras will soon go away, so wouldn't you want the off camera guy for the long term? Sheesh. Kudos to Brett for trying to protect his and Olivia's privacy and not look like jerks on camera. That might be why the production team doesn't like him, and it might be why he's been assigned the villain role so early on in the show. They can't get anything juicy out of him. He won't play nice. Next week should be interesting.

The moment I see them I skip. They just seem so phony to me. I'll add to that when one of the experts starts with "this is a real marriage"...skip.

Christina, just leave, now, and don't drag this out. There's nothing there with Henry nor has there ever been anything. Henry has never really tried to make a go of the marriage...he gave up at the altar, not after the wedding.

I don't know how many times I said to the TV screen "Olivia, SHUT UP". The woman is so tiresome with her constant complaining. Brett came off as mature and affectionate, and I think that's the real Brett. Olivia's face was all pinched and she couldn't really even explain to Rev. Cal why she thought Brett wasn't really really deep down to the very core of his being sincere and not fake. Whatever.

Olivia & Brett have been hard to read because they have done so many things contrary to what we usually see on this show. They seem to talk a lot about serious issues in a marriage. We've never really seen them actually argue. We now know it's Olivia that has put the brakes on sex, yet apparently these two made a pact and actually honored it that they would keep their sex life private. That's contrary to Karen and Miles and most any couple in previous seasons. For all the negative people post about Brett, you'd have thought he would for sure have said something so everyone knew it wasn't him that didn't want sex. But he remained mum. They still maintain they are attracted to each other, even to pointing out things they like about each other. I wish they didn't have so many dealbreakers (kids for him....endless things for her) as I think they might have had a chance.

LOL, I'm sarcastic AND worked in HR 20 plus years. There are a lot of women who could handle Brett's sarcasm and throw it right back at him.