South Portland’s Chelsea Roy, who was among the final eight contestants on last winter’s season of ABC’s “The Bachelor” before being eliminated, will try again on this August’s “Bachelor in Paradise” spinoff show.
“Why throw in the towel when you can bring it to Paradise,” Roy wrote in an Instagram post this week. “I never give up… especially on love.”
Roy was initially cast as “ the villain” on the 22nd season of the matchmaking reality show by TV critics before winning over some fans with her heartfelt comeback story.
On “The Bachelor” and “The Bachelorette,” dozens of suitors try to convince the show’s central star to ostensibly fall in love with them over the course of several dates, with the field whittled down over time and the winner receiving a marriage proposal in the finale.
Early in the last season of “The Bachelor,” reality television watchers called Roy the show’s “villain,” describing her as elbowing out other contestants for race car driver Arie Luyendyk Jr.’s time and badmouthing other competitors.
But she changed some minds after she shared how she worked her way back to stability working in real estate as a single mom. Roy didn’t ultimately win Luyendyk’s hand, however.
Now she’ll be back on the small screen when ABC launches its next season of “Bachelor in Paradise” on Aug. 7, when castoffs from “The Bachelor” and “The Bachelorette” are thrown together on a romantic retreat, where they try to find matches from the among the other former contestants.
In a profile posted online by ABC before the 22nd season of “The Bachelor,” Roy said she has simple tattoos on the palms of her hands, she has a sweet tooth, she wants to travel to France and played soccer and field hockey as a child. As for her preferences when dating? She said she doesn’t like dead silence or “over-the-top” public displays of affection.
“Let me breathe,” was Roy’s message to guys who are too kissy on dates.
Another Mainer — Madawaska native Ashley Hebert — famously finished as the second runner-up on the 15th season of “The Bachelor” in 2011 and later that same year starred as the star of the seventh season of “The Bachelorette.” Hebert’s relationship with winning suitor J.P. Rosenbaum is one of the relatively few cases in which one of the shows’ final pairings actually resulted in a lasting marriage.
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