While we wait for pilot Jake Pavelka to choose Vienna (or Tenley) during the 14th Season of the Bachelor, let’s go all the way back to the beginning and remember the drama that took the world by storm eight years ago during the very first season of ABC’s The Bachelor, which debuted in 2002.
Overachieving power boy Alex Michel was chosen to be the very first Bachelor, and we couldn’t wait to see what happened with Michel because of the dramatic fallout that occurred on the 2000 Fox show Who Wants to Marry a Multi-Millioniare?. That show involved a group of women who weren’t allowed to see their “millionaire” before he chose the one he wanted, nurse Darva Conger married millionaire Rick Rockwell (what a name!) on live television. Their “marriage” ended in annulment, with Conger expressing her outrage about being kissed like that one television. The blushing daisy then made her way straight away to pose for Playboy magazine, because, of course, they cater to modest delicate flowers.
The Bachelor wasn’t quite as crazy as the whirlwind and blind commitment-heavy as WWTMSMM, but it had it’s share of drama when then 31-year-old Alex Michel, a Harvard educated managing consultant and producer chose 23-yearold Amanda Marsh over 29-year-old dancer Trista Rehn, who everyone believed would win.
Michel ended up presenting Amanda Marsh with a ring, but did not outright propose, instead asked her to take a chance on the relationship. Take a chance is right, because it turns out that after the show was over Michel was sending secret emails to Trista Rehn asking her to “leave the door open” in case the relationship with Marsh went sour. With that kind of commitment it, of course, did disintegrate (shocking!). Marsh then took to public interviews to explain her side,telling Inside Edition that she found it hard to get over the fact that Michel slept with Trista during their Fantasy Suite night. After they broke up Trista showed her the emails Michel had send her.
Michel went on to be the spokesperson for Match.com and Princess Cruises and used his background in travel documentary film-making to produce and star in a strange short film called “Our Very Firs Sex Tape,” which went viral on the web:
Michel is currently working for The Lennox Group, a company specializing in tax lien purchases, research, and property management.
Trista Rehn wasn’t done with ABC, however, and appeared in the January 2003 premiere of The Bachelorette where she scored her current husband Ryan Sutter. In a weird Bachelor/Bachelorette twist that may never be duplicated Trista and Ryan have had a long and happy relationship.
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