After proposing to Melissa Rycroft in the final rose ceremony — and then dumping her for runner-up Molly Malaney on the After the Final Rose wrap-up show, The Bachelor’s Jason Mesnick is reacting to the news that Molly will compete on Dancing with the Stars.
“I am so excited for Melissa,” Jason tells Extra, adding, “I know she has danced her whole life and she must be excited for the opportunity. I hope and think she will win it all.”
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Jason Mesnick is in the hot seat this week. Some 17 million viewers watched him get engaged to 25-year-old Dallas beauty Melissa Rycroft on the Mar. 2 season finale of The Bachelor, only to dump her minutes later on the After the Final Rose special. The 32-year-old insurance agent then confessed he still had feelings for 24-year-old department store buyer Molly Malaney.
In an exclusive sit-down interview with PEOPLE, Mesnick defends his decision to end his engagement to Rycroft in front of the cameras.
“That was part of the deal. I signed up for this. Your relationship is — good and bad — in front of everybody,” Mesnick says.
His change of heart occurred after he and Rycroft returned to their normal lives.
“After we got back into the real world, all of a sudden, we had less to talk about, and I didn’t know why,” Mesnick says, adding that as the days went on, he couldn’t stop thinking about runner-up Malaney.
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Melissa Rycroft’s shocking dismissal by fiancé Jason Mesnick on national television was a surprise to Bachelor fans — but not to Rycroft herself.
“I knew on the night After the Final Rose I wasn’t getting dumped,” she tells Ellen DeGeneres in an interview scheduled to air on her talk show Thursday. “We had already ended the relationship. And that was mutual.”
But there was one major surprise in store for Rycroft: the other woman, runner-up Molly Malaney.
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Jason Mesnick says he followed his heart when he broke up with Bachelor winner Melissa Rycroft, pursuing a relationship with finalist Molly Malaney instead. Now, a majority of People.com readers feel that Melissa is still the winner in the situation.
Seventy-seven percent of readers who took our poll say that Melissa is better off without Jason in her life.
In comments, readers expressed sympathy for Melissa, who was dumped on the After the Final Rose show. “I feel bad for Melissa,” writes Sarah. “I am still so mad at the Jason for what he did to her.”
Meanwhile, Jennie believes they’re both winners. “[Melissa is] better off not being with someone that doesn’t care for her the way she deserves,” she writes. “Molly was also better off in that she got a new opportunity to explore something she thinks she wants. Ultimately, win (sort of) for everyone.” (more…)
People are still buzzing about The Bachelor’s shocking twist—including host Chris Harrison.
On today’s Ellen DeGeneres Show, the reality show host shares his perspective on Bachelor Jason Mesnick’s shocking change of heart, which was revealed on the After the Final Rose special Monday night.
When asked if Mesnick, 32, should have chosen Melissa Rycroft, 25, over Molly Malaney, 24, in the finale, Harrison replies, “Oh, yeah, she was terrific. When we left New Zealand [where the finale was filmed in November] we could not [have] been happier because it was a great ending. He is a great guy. This is best ending. She’s going to be a mom [to his son, Ty, 4].”
In January, Harrison tells DeGeneres, he found out that Mesnick wasn’t happy.
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After giving viewers several seasons’ worth of drama, it came as a welcome — if not so surprising — announcement on part two of the Bachelor: After the Final Rose last night that the new Bachelorette would be this season’s fan favorite Jillian Harris.
The 29-year-old interior designer from Alberta, Canada, was one of the last three women remaining on this season’s Bachelor before Jason Mesnick sent her home.
News of the announcement came at the end of last night’s ATFR special. Harris, who got a standing ovation from the audience, said, “I fell in love before and I know it’s a great venue to fall in love again.”
Harris, who had said on the Bachelor she was looking to spend the rest of her life with “her best friend,” will get her shot at love this May when the Bachelorette season kicks off.
Though Harris seemed undeterred by what just transpired on this past season of the show, she did allow that her only fears about accepting the challenge were not making “the right choice the first time” — and her dad seeing another hot tub scene. — Carrie Bell
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With viewers still buzzing about how Jason Mesnick dumped fiancée Melissa Rycroft for runner-up Molly Malaney on the Bachelor: After the Final Rose special that aired Monday night, ABC rolled out part two of After the Final Rose (which was filmed six weeks after the first special) during which Jason and Molly gave fans — and detractors — an update on the status of their relationship.
On the Defensive: First Jason took the hot seat solo. He seemed worried that he might be booed on arrival, but the audience played nice. He explained his actions once again but revealed nothing new. He reiterated: “It was nothing I planned on. It was not the classiest thing in the world, but I had to follow my heart. I don’t regret where I’m at; I’m really happy. Everybody is entitled to feel however they want but that’s what was going on with me. I don’t feel like my feelings were wrong either.”
He did get teary (again…this guy is a crier) watching a clip of his dumping of Melissa. “I’m not proud of what I did to her,” he said. “Nobody deserves to feel that. But I made the right choice for all of us because things were different. All the pressure was worth it. I’ll stand by that forever.”
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ABC’s reality series The Bachelor has had its share of surprising endings, but Jason Mesnick’s on-camera breakup with fiancée Melissa Rycroft and subsequent reunion with runner-up Molly Malaney has been by far the most shocking. But online rumors persist: Was the show’s outcome fixed?
As Bachelor creator Mike Fleiss tells PEOPLE, “That’s patently untrue. It was [Jason's] choice in New Zealand who he proposed to.” But after the show wrapped, Fleiss says, “He was not in love with Melissa anymore and he was in love with Molly and he needed to make a change.”
In fact, no one saw this coming, says Fleiss, who upon returning to the States “was in the process of trying to talk Molly into being the Bachelorette.” “She was finally starting to come around and saying she wanted to do it, and she had spoken to her family,” he says. “I thought she would be a fantastic Bachelorette, so likeable and beautiful and telegenic.”
A week later, Fleiss learned that Jason and Melissa were not getting along, and that he had never stopped thinking about Molly. “My first thought was, ‘Oh, too bad,’” Fleiss says. “My next thought was, ‘Wow, that’s almost too good!’ I knew that was a remarkable twist.
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After last night’s Bachelor finale, Jason Mesnick picked Melissa as The One. But then in a shocking twist, had a change of heart and wound up with Bachelorette No. 2, Molly. While Molly ultimately won Jason’s heart, who do you think really came out on top after last night’s roller-coaster romantic twist. Tell us!
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After weeks of rumors, tricky trailers and heated debate, the finale of The Bachelor had finally arrived. Here’s a look at the most memorable moments that led up to Jason Mesnick bestowing the bling on Melissa Rycroft and then dumping her for runner-up Molly Malaney:
Ty Breaker: The time to meet Jason’s son had finally arrived and as everyone knew it was extremely important to the bachelor. He explained while reuniting with his son on a beach in New Zealand, “This is the biggest step for me in all this. I can see a life with Molly and Melissa, but I can’t fully fall in love with somebody until they meet Ty. I’m here to find that person to spend the rest of my life with. Ty, in his own way, will help me figure it out.”
A putting date and with Melissa was first on the agenda and she was very nervous about whether they “could emerge as a family.” She seemed to win Ty over instantly with high-fives, races and G-rated jokes. Randomly, Jason fetched a baby lamb to pet. Next, she was grilled by his brothers and parents over lunch. Because they watched him get hurt by DeAnna, they were more protective and inquisitive this time around but she seemed to win them over by the end of the afternoon with her honesty, natural charm and obvious love for Jason. Ty woke up for a nap and requested more time with her, which had Jason admitting to his pops that he’d never seen Ty take to anyone that fast. His dad noticed the sparkle between them, but her absent parents was still a big stumbling block.
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