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It may have been two years since Kathy Swarts and Susan Noles appeared on Gerry Turner’s season 1 of The Golden Bachelor, but they can’t help throwing shade at their ex — and comparing him to season 2 lead Mel Owens.
During a September episode of the “Almost Famous” podcast, Susan, 67, noted that Gerry, 74, and Mel, 66, are “night and day” different. Kathy, for her part, quipped that she wants to meet Mel and “sweep him away” from his “suitors.”
“It’s not too late to break them up,” Kathy, 72, continued, to which cohost Ashley Iaconetti asked, “Are you talking about Mel?”
“I’m certainly not talking about Gerry,” Kathy replied.
After Kathy’s candid remark, Ashley pointed out that she appreciated the twosome admitting that the season 1 lead, who hailed from Indiana, was “not the hottest commodity.”
“Let me just break this down Ashley really quick,” Kathy continued. “You can have a lawyer, a football player, a guy who can string together sentences, or you can go pick cotton in a corn maze in Indiana. I don’t know. What do you want to do?”
When Susan and Kathy were cast on the show, the pair claimed that they were not informed of Gerry being the lead until the “last minute.” After news broke that he was the Golden Bachelor, Susan shared that her phone was “blowing up” from loved ones.
“My friends were [asking], ‘Are you still going?’ I go, ‘That’s mean. Yes, I’m going,’” Susan recalled, while Kathy added, “You know what my daughter said? My daughter said, ‘Mom, I’ve known you my whole life. You really think you’re moving to Indiana? It’s never happening.’”
“I’ll eat corn on the cob,” Kathy continued. “That’s as close as I want to get to a cornfield. Thank you very much.”
Kathy and Susan also recalled their fellow contestants’ alleged reactions when learning that Gerry lived on a lake in Indiana, which they believed to be an embellishment.
“And then the girls in our room saying, ‘He called that a lake? It’s a pond,’” Susan said, while Kathy added, “He said he lives on a lake. It’s like a swan boat, paddle wheel thing.”
Despite the playful jabs, the duo noted that they are still on good terms with Gerry.
“We love him. We’re good friends, but hey, it is what it is,’ Susan said, to which Kathy added, “I don’t love him anymore. No, he’s perfectly fine. He’s got a new girlfriend. Actually, I wish him all the best.”
While Kathy and Susan ultimately did not find The One in Gerry, he ended up engaged to Theresa Nist. The couple tied the knot in 2024 before calling it quits months later.
Gerry, who recently announced his engagement to Lana Sutton, is set to chronicle his time on The Golden Bachelor in new memoir The Golden Years (out November 4). In the book, Gerry claimed he told second runner-up Faith Martin that he felt “trapped” ahead of exchanging vows with Theresa — later telling Us Weekly that he “felt like [he] was doing the right thing” by continuing to go through with the marriage.
“I just didn’t feel overjoyed about it,” Turner explained in his Us digital cover story. “So much of the book is about how I felt at certain moments, and that’s only a momentary truth… I had second thoughts, but I don’t think [they] were exaggerated from anyone’s normal second thoughts.”
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Theresa, meanwhile, shared that she wished Gerry handled the situation differently.
“It makes me very sad to think that he felt empty and trapped,” Theresa told Us in an exclusive statement. “I wish he had said something and just ended it. But at least now I understand why he was so hurtful to me so many times. And I will say this. Those in glass houses should not throw stones. I do wish him all the best.”
The Golden Bachelor airs on ABC Wednesdays at 9 p.m. ET.
English (US) ·