Love Is Blind’s Joey Leveille Auditioning For Multiple Dating Reality Shows Is A Red Flag (And I Think Producers Need To Be More Careful With The Vetting Process)

Love Is Blind's Joey Leveille walked away from the show without a wife (although he may have found a potential girlfriend in Sara Carton), but his participation in the reality social experiment is raising some red flags because it wasn't the first time Joey flirted with finding love on TV. Love Is Blind's Joey Laveille for his flowing locks, heavy Minnesota accent, and self-proclaimed "golden retriever" energy. Joey burst onto the scene, claiming he was looking for a partner.

For me, Joey's past antics paint a picture of someone who might be more interested in fame than forever love, and I think producers should take this kind of thing more seriously to uphold the integrity of the show and for the safety of all participants. It's always somewhat surprising to find out that a relative unknown who finds fame on a reality show, specifically a dating reality show, auditioned for other shows previously. It calls into question the person's motives, and whether they're actually interested in finding love or whether they're looking for their 15 minutes of fame.

Look no further than Married At First Sight's Ikechi Ojoré, who stated that he also auditioned for Married At First Sight multiple times before being chosen for season 18. Serial reality show dater, Harry Jowsey, who's appeared on Perfect Match, Too Hot To Handle, reportedly tried to get a spot on Love Island. The premise for shows like The Bachelor, Married At First Sight, and Love Is Blind is that candidates are genuinely looking for romantic matches, and they're willing to go to unconventional lengths to find them.

Joey Leveille Auditioned For The Bachelor

Fans Unearthed Alleged Audition Tape

Red flags started to be raised on Joey before fans unearthed his potential audition video for The Bachelor from 2015. Joey failed to go through with a wedding to Monica Danus, whom he matched with in the pods on Love is Blind. Despite bonding over their love of The Sound of Music, the two never managed to make it out of the friend zone.

Their split seemed amicable until the reunion, when Monica dropped the bomb that she'd discovered Joey had messaged other Love is Blind contestants like Love Is Blind's Madison Errichiello, whom he'd also connected with in the pods. This admission made me look at Joey completely differently. While he hid under his playful persona, he seemed to be an undercover player.

The red flags got even brighter when fans discovered a video on an account said to be Joey's sister, Adriana Leveille, as per YouTube. The video is from 2015 and is 10 minutes long, entitled Bachelor Video. In the video, a young Joey, sans long hair, sits on a chair before a white sheet while someone off-screen asks him questions about himself. Joey hams it up in the video, jokingly saying he's so nervous, but he seems pretty relaxed on camera as the interview progresses.

Joey talks about his job, his dream home, his pets, and his relationship history as the video progresses. However, Joey's game to play along, describing his extreme dream date, before doing some silly stunts that illustrate Joey's interests, like working out and cooking.

While there's no explicit mention of The Bachelor, and we can't be sure this was ever submitted to the show's producers, Joey's participation speaks volumes.

Comments on the video are mostly from a few years back, but since Joey's become more high-profile after Love is Blind, there are more recent remarks that call his motives into question. A YouTube user wrote, "Joey.. did you only want to be on tv when the filming opportunity for love is blind came avail? Eeek," while another said, "Sad to think that this is who Monica fell for during LIB8. She deserved much more. And he had us all fooled with the nice guy act. That's sad."

Joey Was Approached For Love Is Blind More Than Once

Joey Said He Turned Them Down

The Reddit account LoveIsBlindOnNetflix shared a clip of Joey on a recent appearance on a local entertainment show in Minneapolis, The Jason Show. In the clip, Joey claims that Love is Blind producers approached him twice about appearing on the show before he agreed. He said he denied them twice, but at the urging of his sisters, he reached back out and landed a spot.

"Third time's a charm."

It sounds innocent, but commenters poked holes in this theory immediately, noting that producers were casting in Minneapolis for Love is Blind season 8, which is where Joey lives, so they wouldn't have approached him about other seasons. They had to have approached him twice for season 8, which doesn't make much sense.

A Reddit user commented, "I don’t know if he’s being truthful. He’s aggressively Minnesotan and already tried out to be on the Bachelor (lol). Why would he reject a TV offer? He was also never serious about getting married. Too many f******s this season." Another Reddit user wrote, "This just smells like he’s gunning for another show. Damage control central."

Producers Should Be Cautious Of Multiple Auditions

It Should Be An Automatic Red Flag

An appearance on a reality show can benefit participants in many ways. It can be quite lucrative, and lead to other reality show appearances or gigs. It's no wonder why the idea of going on a dating reality show can seem very enticing, so producers need to be extra diligent in the casting process to weed out those with impure intentions.

If I were a producer on a romance-based