Jenn Tran says she considered running offstage during 'The Bachelorette' finale. Here's why she didn't.
While it was "very hard" to watch the proposal with Strader, Tran wanted him to see it.
The Bachelorette fans seem ready to break up with the franchise over the way Jenn Tran’s finale played out. But for the series lead, she’s glad it happened.
In a new interview with Glamour, Tran said she’s happy ABC aired her proposal to Devin Strader after it was revealed that he had broken off their engagement. Not because she wanted the world to see her cry, but she felt it was important for her ex to watch it and “realize why I’m so hurt by what [he] did.”
The Bachelorette also said producers didn’t blindside her by airing the proposal (“They walked me through the game plan” before going live). Though, yes, she did consider running offstage when her emotions got the better of her but decided against it.
What did Tran say about the finale?
During the Sept. 3 finale, viewers learned that Tran chose Strader, who doggedly pursued her throughout the series. However, after getting engaged in May — with Tran turning the tables and popping the question (a franchise first) — she said she realized he’s a different person off-camera. While Tran said she tried to work on their relationship, Strader callously ended their engagement during a 15-minute phone call in August. She claimed he then ghosted her when she tried to speak to him privately before reuniting for the live finale.
That appearance was beyond awkward because after their split was revealed, Tran and Strader then had to watch their romantic engagement — together. The first Asian American Bachelorette didn’t appear to want to see it — "Do I have a choice?" she asked host Jesse Palmer, who didn’t give her an out. Tran then cried throughout as a camera was trained on her, capturing every tear and sniffle. Former Bachelor contestants and viewers criticized producers and the network over how “cruel” and exploitative it felt.
Tran told Glamour, however, that she “did know that was going to happen. They walked me through the game plan. … I just didn’t know how heavy I would be feeling in the moment … seeing [Strader for the first time] and having that conversation that we had. I was very, very anxious that night, and so my emotions were just all over the place.”
She admits it did cross her mind to just walk off the set.
“I think I struggled with: Do I just run offstage, or is that going to make a bigger scene?” she said. “Once the waterworks started, I was like: Oh, this is going to be dramatic if I just run away, so maybe I just sit here? I was just struggling with myself and what to do in that moment.”
While it was “very hard” to watch the proposal with Strader, she wanted him to see it. Tran said “his apologies have been so nonexistent” that she wanted him to see the promises he made during their engagement.
“I’m like, Why don’t you watch this back and listen to the words that you’re saying to me and realize why I’m so hurt by what you did?” she said. “But it was definitely not an easy thing to do” especially because “I didn’t think I was going to be so emotional.”
Tran said that during the commercial breaks, it was “so awkward” sitting alongside her ex. Strader kept asking her to look at him, “and I was like, ‘No, you don’t deserve me to look at you.'”
The reality star revealed that she tried to connect with Strader before the finale. He seemed willing but then “ghosted me.” So she walked into the finale with “my own closure, [knowing] he doesn’t care about my feelings” and that he was only there “to save face for the world but not necessarily help me feel any better.”
She said helping her walk away from the experience was also learning he had allegedly been DMing other women while they were trying to work through their issues.
“What that says to me is you have a lot of growing to do, and this is on you and not me,” she said. “I know how amazing I am and the things that I have to offer, but the fact that he’s sitting here telling me on the phone that he’s going to take this time to really work on himself and he is not going to date, but then turns right back around and lies to me … clearly that is not a me problem. That is a you problem.”
With this romantic saga behind her, she’s looking forward to a “new chapter,” starting with a run on Dancing With the Stars. Then she’ll return to school in January to complete her physician assistant studies. As for whether she’d look for love on television again, “I think at the moment I’m pretty done dating on TV,” she said.
Were there signs that Strader wasn’t ‘the one’?
The broken engagement was a jaw-dropping development during the finale — but the signs were there.
Tran sounded like a smitten woman back in July, just prior to the premiere, calling the show “the best two months of my life” in an interview with People. “I'm very happy with the ending, and I'm very happy with the way everything panned out.”
But early in the season she called out her suitors who had perhaps come on the show for fame — and future podcast and endorsement deals — versus love.
“Are you here because this is a TV show?” she asked them in one episode. “If you think this is not the place you should be, then you need to get out.”
Strader — who had a full-throttle approach to pursuing Tran, declaring his love for her many times over and dominating Tran’s time during group dates — was called out by the other men.
“Devin’s a great talker,” contestant Sam McKinney said during one episode. “The way that he carries himself, his demeanor, he’s a f***ing snake.”
In another episode, Aaron Erb confronted Strader over his lack of seriousness about Tran — and his ego.
Erb has released TikTok videos over the past two days saying he was right and Tran deserved better.
And was Tran ever really the woman of Strader’s dreams? We know from the finale that Strader started following Bachelor Nation’s Maria Georgas on social media after his split with Tran. Georgas had said she was supposed to be the Bachelorette this season but changed her mind. So the implication is that Strader was hoping to land Georgas all along — and is hoping to now that he’s single again.
But it was ultimately Tran’s decision on who would get her final rose. While filming the show, she told People that all she could do was “follow my gut and do what I felt was right. … It's not like I was sitting down with a chalkboard and being like, ‘OK, what qualities does this person have?’ You can't really do that. I think the best way to do it is to feel out how you're feeling.”
She said she walked into the series having already competed for Joey Graziadei’s heart on Season 28 of The Bachelor — and felt that was going to help her.
“What I took from Joey's season was that you need to be vulnerable in order to really let yourself explore these relationships,” she told People. “You got to let these guys see who you are, and you got to let them understand you.”
The truth is — looking at the success rate of the show — there is no winning formula. Golden Bachelorette Joan Vassos and Bachelor Grant Ellis, take note.
