Comedian Melanie Bracewell goes into the trenches for The Women Tell All, the Bachelor NZ live event, and almost gets kicked out in the process. 

“Oh us? Yeah we supplied the roses for all the rose ceremonies,” said one of the two elegantly dressed women standing next to me. She then pressed the button for the third floor.

I had only just reached the Skycity elevator on my way to The Bachelor: Women Tell All VIP experience and I was already starstruck. I had met two official Very Important People who didn’t have to spend $109 on a ticket like I did! They introduced themselves as Erica and Hope before I started bombarding them with questions. Erica told me she hadn’t even seen a single episode of the series. Savage.

Upon arriving at the pre-show function, I made it my first priority to find a man who definitely didn’t want to be there. Who knew I’d find him almost immediately, when we were just lining up to go in?

I entered the room with my new pals Erica and Hope (the rose suppliers), we got our one free “Final Rose” cocktail, which seemed to be a mixture of bubbles and the raspberry flavoured soda stream.

I was the only one making an immediate mad dash to the food table and boy did I get my money’s worth of stale bread and pesto. I scoffed it back, not wanting that 2% alcoholic drink to go to my head too quickly. I had some gossiping to do.

Much to the excitement of the crowd, the Bachelorettes started to arrive at the party. Well, most of them. Naz and Fleur were notably absent. I was told by an anonymous source that the final two were kept completely separate backstage. Apparently Fleur tried to visit the other girls but was dragged away almost immediately. Ooh, scandalous.

The first chat I had was with Shari ‘kicked off for being too funny’ Flavall. “It’s me, Melanie Bracewell, from Twitter!” I exclaimed. Then we shaka’d the night away.

Ceri was next to be hounded. We hugged and she talked about how much she loved The Spinoff! I dropped my cover and said “I’ll probably write a little thing about this event for The Spinoff tomorrow!” (This here is the little thing!)

A nearby Bachelor publicist overheard this. She finally approached and tried to ask me to leave, saying that there was a complete “media ban” in place. I explained that I had bought a ticket just like everyone else and I intended to stay.

The whole interaction confused the hell out of me, though. I didn’t realise you could apply a media ban to an event where literally anyone could buy a ticket. I met people who had traveled all the way from Christchurch to be there. There was about a hundred people in the room, all tweeting, Facebooking, snapchatting and instagramming. Hell, there was probably someone posting on Bebo about it.

I quickly became this publicist’s worst enemy. She approached me a number of times telling me that, if I was in fact here for The Spinoff, I would be escorted out of the building. “I’m not here for the Spinoff!” I said. Which was true! 

Or at least, only a half-lie. I initially bought my ticket because I wanted to find out if Jordan was as boring in real life as he was on the show. It was only dumb luck that I was asked to write about it afterwards.

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Anyway, these are all the things that happened to me as a VIP guest – the dark Bachelor truths publicity didn’t want you to read:

1) Jordan really was just as boring in real life

I had a quick chat with Jordan when he arrived at the party. I introduced him to Erica and told him that she sourced all the roses for the ceremonies. He wasn’t excited about it at all.

“Without her you would just be handing out twigs!” I said, before realising I was getting way too passionate.

“Oh, so you’re to blame,” he said to her smugly. It would seem he’d just blessed us with a joke.

I didn’t really get the joke. Was he saying it would’ve been better with twigs? The roses were bad? That she’s the reason the show exists and that’s bad? Either way, Jordy Pordy Pudding Pie needs to get better at jokes that aren’t just Gollum impressions and bad puns on his Instagram.

He did another almost-joke in our interaction. I got someone to take a photo of us, and she couldn’t get it out of selfie mode. “Taking too many selfies, eh?” he said. Classic Jordan.

His personality was almost as stale as the bread tbh.

To be fair, there were probably a number of reasons he didn’t want to be there – confronting 23 ex-girlfriends at once isn’t ideal. Plus, he probably wanted to avoid the girl who spent 10 minutes trying to get a closeup of him on Snapchat so she could put the silly hat filter on him.

2) There were mums meeting other mums

By far, the highlight of the occasion was when all of the families of the Bachelorettes met.

“You’re Ceri’s Mum? I’m Danielle’s Mum and this is Rebecca’s Mum,” was the most heartwarming line I heard all evening.

When Jordan was moping around, the Mums got to meet him too, which was almost like a supercut of home visits. Well, it would be, if all the Bachelorettes lived in Bar 21 at Skycity. Ceri’s Mum told me what she wanted to say to Jordan, “you didn’t kiss my daughter, but you can kiss me!” I really wish she actually did.

3) Overheard conversations

People were taking selfies with the contestants. I heard a girl walk past and say “I’m into it… but I’m not that into it.” I laughed a lot. I just want to be that rich where I can spend $109 on a ticket to something I’m not that keen on.

I also witnessed two women chatting to Jordan’s Mum for five minutes before making the revelation. “Oh shit! You’re his Mum!”

Ceri also did the same thing which was even more hilarious. She started bad-mouthing Jordan to Jordan’s Mum before realising. Bless. I’d do the same

4) Kate is cool

Honestly, I’m so mad I never got to talk to Kate. She was so entertaining throughout the entire filming process. It would’ve been an absolute punishment without her. Don’t get me wrong, all the girls had something interesting to say, but Kate really made it clear she was just as bored as we were whenever Jordan opened his mouth. She even interrupted him at one point to ask if she could have a wine. Preach.

The event was called ‘Women Tell All’ but it truly felt like it should’ve been called ‘Jordan Talks For Three hours While Somehow Managing To Say Nothing At All’ or just ‘Shut The Fuck Up, Jordan’. People in the audience were literally yawning in face.

5) Michael Hill was in the audience

Yaaassss Michael!

6) There was a quiz?? Why was there a quiz?

What? Who cares about your superyachts, Jordan?

7) Fleur and Jordan at the afterparty

So one of Ceri’s friends cancelled, leaving her with one spare ticket to the After Party. I leaped at the opportunity. As we entered the venue, however, I was greeted by my best friend. The publicist. Again.

“Does your friend work for The Spinoff?”

“No,” Ceri said, and I was let in.

Niiiiiice! Gosh, who knew lying was so easy and fun?

Me and Ceri’s sister were literally the only people on the dance floor. Going hard to ‘I Gotta Feeling’ by The Black Eyed Peas. The Bachelorettes were milling about. More stale bread. Free booze.

Finally, Jordan and Fleur arrived. I was expecting a kind of ‘first dance’ situation, but that wasn’t the case at all. In fact, they barely even talked to each other the entire time I was there. They entered the room together, but Fleur immediately sat in the corner with her friends, and Jordan chatted to some poor guy for about 45 minutes.

I tried to take a photo of it but my phone battery died. Probably from all those selfies I was taking eh, Jordan? Classic!

I didn’t see them talk at all after that. They were so far apart it was almost comical. If they’re actually still together it made absolutely no sense. If you’re finally at a point where you’re not forcefully separated, surely you’d at least hang out in the same part of the room?

But what do I know. In the wise, clichéd words of Jordan, “love is a beautiful thing.”

BONUS PICS:

Ellen-like selfie, with the three I could find in the lobby.

Adjusting Claudia’s wardrobe malfunction, Mike playing excellent censor-er.

Exclusive interview with Scout, where I did a “Arya in Game of Thrones” and said I was no one.

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Listen to The Spinoff’s ‘The Fantasy Suite’ Bachelor NZ podcast below, or download here on iTunes, or here on Stitcher – and click here for more amazing Bachelor NZ coverage from The Spinoff.