Speaker 1: Or Joe's.
Speaker 2: This is a very very special part of the podcast
Speaker 2: because I can't tell you the last time that I
Speaker 2: sat in a car park Elizabeth with John Akem for matts.
Speaker 1: I can't even remember.
Speaker 3: List.
Speaker 4: I can't think of the last time I did it either.
Speaker 3: Do you remember, John? Do you know?
Speaker 5: It was one of the things I've always wanted to do.
Speaker 5: It's on my bucket list. I'm sitting here in a
Speaker 5: car park with a two of you, early in the
Speaker 5: morning on Friday.
Speaker 3: It doesn't get better.
Speaker 1: It's what dreams are made of.
Speaker 4: Isn't it? Isn't it?
Speaker 6: One thing we found out about you this morning is
Speaker 6: you played cricket for New Zealand.
Speaker 5: Yes, in New Zealand A. I played it for about
Speaker 5: a decade and yeah, I loved it, but ultimately Maps
Speaker 5: has taken over since then.
Speaker 1: It seems like a bit of a strange transition.
Speaker 4: Yes, it does.
Speaker 2: I'm playing for New Zealand A and playing professional cricket
Speaker 2: to becoming a relationship expert on Maps.
Speaker 1: So how do you get there?
Speaker 5: Well, it was kind of a bit of luck, you know.
Speaker 5: I went into private practice. I was seeing singles and
Speaker 5: couples after cricket, and then One day in twenty fourteen,
Speaker 5: I got a email asking for an audition for a
Speaker 5: crazy show where you marry strangers at first sight. And
Speaker 5: I remember showing my wife thinking what do you think
Speaker 5: of this? And she thought, well, this is pretty weird.
Speaker 3: It could be.
Speaker 5: Fun, so I went for it. And then we're now
Speaker 5: ten seasons on and the show goes into one hundred
Speaker 5: and twenty countries, So it's changed my life.
Speaker 6: It's an absolute juggernau at this show, isn't it. Do
Speaker 6: you think people go on to it genuinely wanting to
Speaker 6: find love or is it a bit tricky? Is it
Speaker 6: people wanting to get their own OnlyFans account or boost
Speaker 6: their Instagram following, or get a breakfast radio gig?
Speaker 4: What is it?
Speaker 6: Yeah?
Speaker 3: Well I think it's a combination. Now.
Speaker 5: I think all of them capable of coping with cameras
Speaker 5: on them, and they don't mind the spotlight at all.
Speaker 5: So there is that sense of, you know, I want
Speaker 5: some sort of attention, but then you've also got a
Speaker 5: want for finding love. And what I would say is
Speaker 5: that what's compelling when you watch these guys on the
Speaker 5: show is that they aren't good at relationships. They're very
Speaker 5: poor at them, but they don't really know why. And
Speaker 5: so one of the things we're doing is we're matching them,
Speaker 5: but then holding a mirror up to try and teach
Speaker 5: them how to do better.
Speaker 2: Do you ever get with some of the couples early on?
Speaker 2: Do you ever go this is shit, Oh, this isn't
Speaker 2: going to work.
Speaker 3: Look, and you're a dick it?
Speaker 1: Do you ever have those things?
Speaker 3: I wouldn't.
Speaker 5: I wouldn't perhaps say that's the exact word that I'm
Speaker 5: thinking when I'm sitting on the couch. But what I
Speaker 5: would say is that I get very disappointed when they
Speaker 5: don't work out. Sometimes I get shocked at how different
Speaker 5: they are when the cameras roll, because you know you do.
Speaker 5: It's a two month matching process. You get to meet them,
Speaker 5: you test them, you really deep dive on them, and
Speaker 5: you think a lot about the matches. So when they
Speaker 5: don't work out, and particularly when they don't work out early,
Speaker 5: it's really hard to watch.
Speaker 3: And all the experts feel that way.
Speaker 2: I would want to make relationship work to not disappoint Johnny.
Speaker 6: I've met him for one morning and I just want
Speaker 6: him to be happy with me.
Speaker 5: Let me tell you, they don't mind disappointing me at
Speaker 5: all our participants on the show. And you know, that's
Speaker 5: one of the things that I think people watch for
Speaker 5: because it's very compelling on the on the couch. When
Speaker 5: we have those commitment ceremonies, when they come at us
Speaker 5: and they don't like what we're saying, it's really interesting
Speaker 5: TV because you don't often see that with reality shows.
Speaker 6: I want to ask about Harrison, I do want I
Speaker 6: don't because I think I just think he is a
Speaker 6: self involved narcissist.
Speaker 4: Is that an accurate description?
Speaker 3: I think I think Jordy's been triggered by this fellow.
Speaker 4: Yeah, because I've met some Harrison's in my time.
Speaker 1: So you like Harrison.
Speaker 5: She can't stop talking about it, that's for sure. Look,
Speaker 5: Harrison is very unique. He's unapologetic, he's very opinionated. He's
Speaker 5: an alpha.
Speaker 4: You said to me, he's just getting started.
Speaker 5: Yeah, Oh look, I tell you what. He is a
Speaker 5: major player throughout this series. He does things that really
Speaker 5: polarize the group. Also his partner, and so we have
Speaker 5: to call him out a lot. And I think also
Speaker 5: this year, the guys on the show, they're very strong
Speaker 5: with their bro code. So we have a job to
Speaker 5: do as experts to really break them down and get
Speaker 5: them to take some accountability. And frankly, a lot of
Speaker 5: them don't want to hear it. So you know, we
Speaker 5: have to be very direct in the short amount of
Speaker 5: time that we have on the couch to get through
Speaker 5: to them.
Speaker 1: You guys have been doing this for so long.
Speaker 2: Are you finding a shift in generation with how people
Speaker 2: deal with feedback from the first season to now?
Speaker 3: Totally? Totally?
Speaker 5: So now, you know, there's almost I can see it
Speaker 5: in their faces when I'm you know, the angry guy
Speaker 5: on the couch, you know, giving them a serve. They
Speaker 5: are looking at me like, you know, no one's spoken
Speaker 5: to me like this before, no one's held me accountable
Speaker 5: or held up a mirror to me, And so I
Speaker 5: think it takes them a while to get used to it.
Speaker 5: Some of them simply don't. They just resist, they refuse
Speaker 5: to listen. Others take it on board and they can
Speaker 5: change during the experiment. But any bad behavior, we've got
Speaker 5: a job to make sure that we're calling it out.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I mean, I hate nassism, But let's talk about
Speaker 6: me for a second.
Speaker 1: That's a classic segue, isn't it.
Speaker 4: I want to ask you breakfast radio. When you've got
Speaker 4: a duo, it's like a marriage.
Speaker 6: It's basically like an early morning marriage, probably seeing this
Speaker 6: person more than you see your own partner. We've just
Speaker 6: started out, we have a we've started with a great basis,
Speaker 6: great friendship. We really genuinely respect each other wise and
Speaker 6: let me just.
Speaker 1: Carry off there. There's a few little cracks. Is that
Speaker 1: what you're going to say?
Speaker 3: A little concern just starting to grow between the time.
Speaker 6: It's going to ask what's the key to longevity in
Speaker 6: a breakfast radio relationship?
Speaker 4: Do you think, well, we're tired a lot.
Speaker 5: Yes, I do think you've got to kind of be
Speaker 5: friends going in or at least.
Speaker 3: Develop that friendship pretty quickly.
Speaker 5: And that's not different to like an intimate relationship either.
Speaker 5: You know, you've got to do little things that build
Speaker 5: the chemistry.
Speaker 3: You know, so.
Speaker 5: You know, catching up outside of work, you know, to debrief,
Speaker 5: or when one of you texts the other person, you
Speaker 5: immediately get back to them, or you actually start sharing
Speaker 5: about your personal life outside of just what you're doing
Speaker 5: on the radio.
Speaker 3: So all those things.
Speaker 5: Sort of act like a little bit of a glue
Speaker 5: that sticks you together as opposed to two people that
Speaker 5: just literally come in with their own egos, they do
Speaker 5: their part, and then they leave.
Speaker 3: You're not about the egos, you too, You're all about
Speaker 3: the love.
Speaker 1: And you said that since day.
Speaker 2: We'd be quite seriously and we're in a pretty good
Speaker 2: spot because we probably know too much about each other.
Speaker 5: And I think I think one of the biggest challenges
Speaker 5: is when you know, because obviously you can see your
Speaker 5: growing in terms of your success and it's going up,
Speaker 5: and that's when things, I think become really challenging. Whenever
Speaker 5: you have success, that's when the egos start coming into it.
Speaker 5: And being able to stay grounded and friends is a
Speaker 5: key part of not letting that get away.
Speaker 4: Forgot to tell you how accurate everything you've just said is.
Speaker 1: Because you're doing this for free.
Speaker 4: I mean we're on the same money, right.
Speaker 5: I don't know if I want to be around for
Speaker 5: this conversation.
Speaker 2: Personally, Jonas Well, I've got a brother in law who
Speaker 2: is in the Wild Maths fraternity.
Speaker 1: Michael Goonan. First of all, do you remember.
Speaker 5: Oh, I love Mickey g I mean he bought the
Speaker 5: Thunder in series seven. I mean he called people out,
Speaker 5: he was authentic, he was funny, and you know, he
Speaker 5: was a breath of fresh air and look, I haven't
Speaker 5: seen him for a while, but he made an impact
Speaker 5: and I loved watching him in that experiment.
Speaker 2: Well, I mean lucky it went both ways because I've
Speaker 2: spoken Michael about he said that I love the experts,
Speaker 2: so thank god it went both ways.
Speaker 1: If John was about to go, I couldn't stand him.
Speaker 4: Is it glad he went on that?
Speaker 6: He?
Speaker 2: I think so, Like he hasn't he hasn't spoken badly
Speaker 2: of it, Like he has put it down as a
Speaker 2: really really fun and unusual.
Speaker 1: But a positive experience.
Speaker 3: It didn't work, Yeah it did. It didn't work, but
Speaker 3: it does change their lives.
Speaker 5: I mean that's the thing that I watch now, you know,
Speaker 5: because some of them go on to such huge notoriety,
Speaker 5: you know, from podcasts only fans to you know, doing
Speaker 5: TV or radio. It is it's a complete overhaul of
Speaker 5: their life for some of them, and it's interesting to
Speaker 5: watch where they go after that.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I think he enjoyed as well, because he didn't have
Speaker 2: intentions of getting to the media or starting a podcast
Speaker 2: or anything. He has his own business and that's all
Speaker 2: he's known and that's all he wants to do. This
Speaker 2: was like, oh, I'll just have a crack of this
Speaker 2: and see how it goes. And it was a different
Speaker 2: experience which I'll remember forever.
Speaker 5: I mean, I think one of the challenges when we're
Speaker 5: matching people is there's such big personalities now and because
Speaker 5: they don't really have a lot of insight into, you know,
Speaker 5: where they're going wrong with relationships. When they come on
Speaker 5: the show, it can be very confronting and they may
Speaker 5: not learn during the show.
Speaker 3: If it doesn't work out.
Speaker 5: But we're hoping that maybe down the track they think
Speaker 5: about it and think, well, maybe I'm going to do
Speaker 5: this differently.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I'm just trying to work out your pathway.
Speaker 6: Because you managed to get a breakfast radio gig without
Speaker 6: going on MAVs. Big brother brother Johnathan, I could talk
Speaker 6: to you all day.
Speaker 4: Thank you so much for joining us.
Speaker 3: It's a pleasure and I wish you all the best. Guys.
Speaker 3: This is a great chemistry that you've got together.
Speaker 1: From the expert.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, it's just bigger and better things for you too,
Speaker 5: But just the good actors.
Speaker 3: Remember, don't let him get too big on I know
Speaker 3: where he's here.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I've told you keeping grounded.
Speaker 6: This will only mess up. If he starts being a dickhead,
Speaker 6: look I.
Speaker 3: Tell you what. If he starts talking in the third person,
Speaker 3: bring me on.
Speaker 2: It's the biggest warning sign of all the time referring
Speaker 2: to self the third person, John, thank you so much, man,
Speaker 2: it's so good to have you. Adelaide, it's a pleasure. Guys,
Speaker 2: thanks for having me.