ABC Dale Moss and Clare Crawley dance during a date on episode four of The Bachelorette.
Tonight’s highly-anticipated episode of The Bachelorette features the end of Clare Crawley’s time as the season’s lead and will give fans answers regarding her relationship with Dale Moss, whom she leaves the reality show in order to be with.
In a promo for the episode, one of the tensest moments is when one of the contestants asks Crawley, “Were you talking to Dale before the show started?” This has been a point of speculation and controversy from viewers watching the season so far, who are convinced the two must have known each other before filming began in order to have fallen so quickly on the show.
In spite of that theory, Reality Steve asserts that Clare and Dale were not talking before production began and that they really did meet for the first time when he exited the limo for the premiere. He wrote, “Reports they were talking were at first debunked by Michelle Money, and then confirmed by me. There was no pre-show relationship, talking, texting, etc between Clare and Dale.”
Though They Didn’t Meet Before Filming, It Is Likely Crawley Went Into the Season Knowing Who Moss Was
While Reality Steve believes Crawley and Moss were not building a relationship behind the scenes before The Bachelorette production began, he does believe that Crawley did her research once she knew who her contestants were and was quarantined waiting for filming to start. He said, “Clare had 4 months… and if you heard Clare on Rachel and Becca’s podcast, she admitted she absolutely snooped the guys’ profiles and IG stories over those 4 months. Clearly during that time, she fell for Dale.”
Bachelorette host Chris Harrison confirmed to Entertainment Tonight that Crawley did some pre-show snooping to get to know her contestants before meeting them in front of the cameras, revealing, “[Clare] admitted to me that she started looking through and getting an idea of what these guys stood for, who they were — not a terrible idea, and maybe that’s something we incorporate into the future of this show.”
Crawley Said Meeting Moss Was a Feeling She’s ‘Never Felt Before’
Aside from the fact that it is unprecedented for a Bachelor lead to find love and drop out of the season only two weeks into filming, speculation that Clare and Dale had met previously was likely rooted in her on-camera reaction to meeting him on night one.
When Moss stepped out of the limo, there was an instant spark between the two. Crawley remarked that she had been waiting for it, and as he walked away she went as far as to tell Harrison she thought she “just met [her] husband.”
Remembering that night, Crawley told Entertainment Tonight, “That feeling that I’ve never felt before… just standing in front of a man, connecting on that level, and it being electric between each other – I’ve never felt that instantly like that before. I had never felt it before, and I never even knew what to expect with those feelings. When you have not experienced it or felt it, you don’t know if it exists, but when you feel it, you know exactly what that feeling is.”
As the season (briefly) continued to progress with Crawley as The Bachelorette, it was made even more clear that she only has eyes for and interest in Moss. She ditched the other group date men in favor of private time with Moss in her hotel room and defensively referenced to Moss as her “fiancé” after some of the contestants made fun of him during a comedy roast date.
New episodes of The Bachelorette season 16 air on Tuesday nights at 8/7c on ABC.
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