“Uhm, JULIE, are those dating shows on Reality TV real or fake?” “Is that cute guy Guile you’re setting up on “The Match Off” really single and available?”
It was amazing to me how many people inquired about my current upcoming TV appearance on “The Match Off”. “Are these men and women we’re seeing on reality TV actors, are they faking it all for the screen? Or are they The Real Deal?”
The Julie Ferman Team had so much fun filming our segment of NBC’S “The Match Off”. My hubby, Gil and I have done hundreds of dating and matchmaking related film and TV shoots for the nearly 20 years we’ve been in the luv biz, and our experience with NBC was fantastic. Five days of filming for a 30-minute show ought to give you an idea of the extensive work that goes into the production of a reality TV show. Not to mention the hours of office work, behind the scenes to find the talent.
Well, I can’t speak for all of the reality shows in production at the moment, but I can tell you the honest to goodness truth about how we did the casting for our segment of The Match Off. It was no easy feat.
When working with a TV show, we never have the lead time we want, so it’s always a mad scramble to pull together a great date for the single love seeker who’s being featured. Typically I have six months to a year to work with a particular matchmaking client, incorporating tons of dating coaching, ongoing feedback, recruiting activities, and a series of introductions — all enabling me to continually refine and tweak our strategy for the client. But when making magic happen for TV, matchmaking needs to be done much more quickly.
To lasso a great match for Guile? We had two days. Yowza! Fortunately, with over 17,000 single love seekers privately registered with www.JulieFerman.com, we have a big advantage, and isolating a group of 100 or so young cuties, all adorable and in their 20’s wasn’t really a struggle. But finding one whom we felt he would be attracted to and interested in? Who might just go for him too? And then the real trick — finding one who fit all of our criteria AND who was willing to bring her love life into focus on national TV. Whoa baby, that’s when the potential candidate list takes a real hit. 9 out of 10 say “No way!”
Being the dating and coaching experts that we are, we braced ourselves and really focused on those we felt would fit the Guile bill. Many fell off our radar because of schedule conflicts, bunches of them lacked the “wow” factor when we met with them in person, and we just didn’t think bachelor Guile would “go” for them. Are you beginning to see why casting for these shows might just be a full time job? But we did it. We found a gorgeous, fun, athletic girl named Veronica. You’ll see her tonight on NBC’s “The Match Off”, 7:30 p.m. in LA, and then again after “Saturday Night Live” at 1 a.m. We loved the whole experience.