Thomas van der Vlugt, who this season was the main character in the reality show De Bachelor, was face to face with his biggest critic on the talk show HLF8 on Friday evening: presenter Leonie ter Braak.
Leonie ter Braak loves to watch The Bachelor, but only if the main character is nice and vulgar. For example, she finds the Flemish TV bachelor Fabrizio Tzinaridis extremely entertaining, while she continuously falls asleep with his Dutch counterpart Thomas van der Vlugt. She even complained about this to Eva Jinek last week.
Cheese sandwich
The 41-year-old Leonie was especially in Eva’s talk show to talk about De Bachelor and described Thomas there as ‘a sandwich with cheese’. “It’s very much like a cheese sandwich and a glass of milk to me. He is just very Dutch.”
She continued: “Thomas cries with every goodbye and of course you don’t want to watch this show to see a Bachelor cry, do you? He’s a very sweet boy. He just wants to talk to the girls. You watch The Bachelor because it’s a guilty pleasure, so you want to be a bit of a bad guy, right?”
‘I’m going to be honest’
Leonie could not suspect then that Johnny de Mol would step down as the presenter of HLF8 and that a week later, last Friday, she had to interview Thomas in that program. Suddenly she came face to face with the ‘Bachelor’ whom she had attacked so hard just before.
She confessed honestly: “I’ll be honest with you for a moment. I was a guest at Jinek’s last week and then I talked about you. I’m all in The Bachelor, but in two Bachelors. I’m looking at the Flemish edition and the Dutch one. The contrast between you and the Flemish Bachelor is gigantic to say the least.”
Bit boring
Leonie says it right to Thomas’ face: “You are a very good Bachelor, almost boring when you compare it, because that Flemish boy just does everything. If I call you boring, do you see that as an insult or a compliment?”
Thomas: “No. I just wanted to be so respectful with those ladies. They are all not used to those cameras and those situations. They also do not know what is happening to them, because they are suddenly under a magnifying glass. I want to accommodate them as best I can. I just want to respect them and you don’t want to hurt them on TV, so I was just being sensitive about it.”
‘Now I feel bad’
It’s a shame when people find him boring, says Thomas. “Some people think it’s a bit boring, but I think I just did it as neatly as possible.”
Leonie: “It’s just a very big compliment with this explanation, Thomas. Now I feel all bad.”
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