TLC Exec Reveals His Biggest 90 Day Fiance Regret
There's no doubt that the 90 Day Fiancé franchise is an incredibly successful one. The original show has spawned spinoffs including 90 Day Fiancé: Before the 90 Days and 90 Day Fiancé: Happily Ever After. All in all, the success of the series is enough to make any TV exec happy.
TLC exec Alon Orstein, senior VP of production and development, does have one major regret when it comes to 90 Day Fiancé, though. Some people might think that reality TV shows like 90 Day Fiancé are scripted, but this 90 Day Fiancé: The Other Way moment caught Orstein by surprise."I will say for us, and maybe because it's just still fresh in mind, but when we found out that Sumit was married, that really caught us off guard," Orstein recently told E! News. "And I remember vividly where I was in the office when I heard about it and talking about it on the phone with our production partners, Sharp. It was definitely a moment."
Sumit's fiancee, Jenny, had no idea that Sumit was already married when she moved to India to be with him. The cameras weren't following the couple when the news broke. According to Orstein, cameras are not always on the cast, and the fact that Sumit and Jenny were in India at the time meant filming was more restricted.
TLC execs rushed to get a film crew to India
"So, we quickly scrambled a crew and got them out there because we thought it was a very relevant and important part of the story to tell, provided everyone was still OK participating and telling that story," he said. "And that definitely was probably one of the most shocking moments, at least in recent memory on the franchise."
Because there wasn't a camera crew in India at the time, a lot of the drama wasn't filmed. Once the crew arrived, Jenny had to retell the story of Sumit's father-in-law confronting the 90 Day Fiancé couple.
"That's probably one of our biggest regrets, something along those lines," said Orstein of not capturing everything live. "But it's possible it may have played out differently if cameras were there too. I think what the crew was able to capture on the heels of that was very compelling. It happens on a lot of shows, not just 90 Day. When we come in right on the heels of something, we do our best to make sure that we tell the story in a compelling way that still gets viewers insights into what happened and what they might've missed."