On the cutting room floor! As first revealed on Us Weekly’s “Here for the Right Reasons” podcast, JoJo Fletcher filmed scenes with Tayshia Adams for Matt James’ season of The Bachelor that didn’t make it to air.
“We went to just, like, you seen other contestants come down and help them out. Tayshia and I actually came down, did the whole quarantine, had a date with Matt,” the 30-year-old season 12 Bachelorette told exclusively told Us while promoting her and fiancé Jordan Rodgers partnership with Autotrader. “You film so much stuff for this show and inevitably certain things have to get cut just based on how the show plays out. So, Tayshia and I got the call and they’re like, ‘Hey, we’re so sorry, but with editing and everything that’s going on we’re gonna have to scratch that date, it just doesn’t make sense.’ It’s totally fine, we had so much fun doing it.”
She joked, “Yes, we were actually there, it wasn’t like a hologram of us over there, it just didn’t air.”
Fletcher previously stepped in for host Chris Harrison to film episodes of Adams’ season 16 of The Bachelorette last year. In January, photos of the two Bachelorettes at Nemacolin surfaced online.
“When we got to talk to him, I was like, ‘How are you feeling? Because you’ve never done this before. This is it overwhelming for somebody who just came from it let alone, like, getting used to everything and just being the lead is very hard,” Fletcher told Us of her chat with James. “And awesome, like, don’t get me wrong, it’s awesome [too].”
Fletcher added that she thinks James, 29, has done an “exceptional job” as the season 25 star.
“[He’s owned] the fact that, ‘Yeah, I’ve never done this before.’ I think that he is a total catch,” she told Us, referring to the fact that James didn’t appear on the Bachelorette before he was named the Bachelor. “Meeting him and watching him — I’ve been saying this — I think he could be one of the best Bachelors we’ve ever had. And that’s hard to do. It’s hard to do when you’ve never done it. I’m really happy with them selecting him [and] him being the Bachelor. [I’m] just really excited for him. He’s a really good guy.”
While Bachelor viewers have to tune in to find out whether James is engaged to one of his contestants, Fletcher and Rodgers, who got engaged during the August 2016 finale, told Us the post-show advice that they give to Bachelor Nation couples.
“I never watched the show,” the football analyst, 32, said. “I knew what happened from my perspective and that that was all I needed. But it’s hard not to see Twitter, see the headlines. And so, for the advice — because we struggled with this — as much as you can, I know it’s impossible in this day and age, [but] try to block it out and try to lean into your partner because you’re learning about each other. You’re learning how to fight, you’re learning how to communicate things that you weren’t able to do kind of in a fantasy land [or] in a bubble.”
Rodgers continued: “I think that’s the hard part: to put blinders on, lean into your partner and just talk everything through. … Our first year was so hard because we didn’t have that figured out yet. We didn’t know how to communicate; we didn’t know how to fight healthy and be good on the other side of it. We didn’t know how to block it out.”
While Fletcher noted that Bachelor viewers are “the most supportive” and “awesome” fans, she added, “Everyone knows that there’s a lot of critique and criticism. And to not have experienced that in the capacity the show brings out and to do it for the first time with your partner, I think it could be a little more challenging. So, my advice to him would just be to expect it know that it’s coming, lean into your partner and do your best to not listen to the outside noise.”
Rodgers concluded, “Give us a call! We did it all wrong. We’ve done it right. We’ve done everything in between so we can be good advice as well.”
For more Bachelor Nation news — including a breakdown of the controversy surrounding Chris Harrison and Rachael Kirkconnell— listen to Us Weekly‘s “Here for the Right Reasons” podcast.