MAFS bombshell: Davina Rankin makes new claims about the reality show’s experts

Former Married At First Sight contestant Davina Rankin has lashed out at the show’s panel of experts, saying they are little more than puppets of the show’s producers.

The Married At First Sight experts are under fire yet again, but this time it’s from a former participant on the show.

Speaking to News Corp this week, Davina Rankin claimed John Aiken, Dr Trisha Stratford and Melanie Schilling are simply “there to make it [the show] look legitimate” and are not doing enough to protect those taking part within the romantic experiment.

“We never spoke to them one-on-one off camera,” Rankin said, adding, “we didn’t have anything to do with them ever.”

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Married At First Sight experts. Picture: Channel 9

Rankin also claims that all three experts wear earpieces during the weekly commitment ceremonies in which couples opt to stay or leave. The earpieces, she says, allow producers to direct the expert questioning.

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“Even when you speak to them at the commitment ceremonies they’re not actually talking to you, they’re talking through the earpiece with the producers. So they’re not actually giving you advice, they’re getting guided as to what to ask or to tell us so they can get the right answers out in front of the cameras,” Rankin says.

Davina Rankin says she was not offered the proper level of support required by Endemol Shine after appearing on Married At First Sight. Picture: Channel 9

A spokesperson for Endemol Shine Australia, the production company for Married At First Sight responded to the claims, saying: “We do not comment on specific production matters.”

“I needed therapy after the show. I was really struggling and they [the show’s producers] put me in touch with someone and her advice was to get antidepressants from my local GP. That was the support that I got from Channel 9,” she said angrily.

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“They couldn’t even give me the name of someone in Brisbane to go and sit down with; it was ridiculous. I feel so bad for the people who are going through it now.”

Ines Basic came under fire from viewers after verbally abusing her husband in the experiment, Bronson Norrish. Picture: Channel 9

A spokesperson for Endemol Shine, however, responded saying: “The wellbeing of our participants is always our first priority, so medical support is naturally provided when required and psychological support is fully available to all participants at any time throughout production, broadcast and beyond through an off-screen psychologist dedicated to the show.”

Rankin, who was cast as the villain in her 2018 season after she and Dean Wells discussed leaving their respective matched partners for one another, also said that after the series aired she struggled to return to normal life.

Partipicant Cyrell Paule got into a heated argument with Martha Kalifatidis in an episode that aired this week. Picture: Instagram

Three weeks ago a petition calling to have Schilling removed from the show after she was seen to defend Ines Basic for verbally abusing her husband, amassed over 65,000 signatures.

Then earlier this week the experts came under fire again for allowing Cyrell Paule to remain on the show after she physically and verbally attacked fellow participant Martha Kalifatidis.

“Its [sic] funny when women get violent but abuse when men do it. Double standards!” one viewer of the show wrote after the altercation aired on Tuesday.

“How does this kind of behaviour make it to TV? Channel 9 should be ashamed of themselves,” another wrote on Instagram.