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Justice may be blind, but it’s hard to look away from the legal mess Love is Blind has become.
Back in October, reality series contestant Tran Dang went after Love is Blind production companies Kinetic Content and Delirium TV with a sexual assault, false imprisonment and negligence lawsuit. Now, Season 5 participant Renee Poche is suing Delirium and Netflix to stop a $4 million arbitration the producers took against her in November for “some limited public remarks about her distressing time on the Program, including the terrifying experiences she had with Wall.”
Similar to claims Dang made last year, Poche details what allegedly really went down behind the sordid scenes during her time on Love Is Blind.
“On her first night in Los Angeles, the Program’s production staff seized Poche’s phone, passport, and driver’s license,” today’s complaint says. “When not filming, Poche was locked in her hotel room, unable to leave without a ‘castwrangler’ accompanying her. She was expressly forbidden from interacting not only with otherparticipants but also with random hotel guests and staff. In some ways, and this is a sentiment shared by many participants, Poche felt like a prisoner.”
“This dispute is ripe for adjudication because Delirium has initiated arbitration against Poche for purportedly violating her unlawful nondisclosure agreement,” states the complaint filed in LA Superior Court by lawyers Bryan Freedman and Mark Geragos on January 2. “Poche contends that the Agreement is itself illegal and unenforceable and brings this action to vindicate her legal rights under California law.”
The jury trial seeking action wants a court declaration that the NDA is “illegal, invalid and unenforceable,” as well as a handful of damages. (read Renee Poche’s labor code lawsuit against Netflix and Love Is Blind producers here)
Of course, context always being King, it is important to view Poche’s action and her legal team in the wider landscape of a barrage of recent Reality TV suits from Bethenny Frankel and others trying to pull back the veil on how the unscripted drama is really made – and it ain’t pretty.
“Love may be blind but the studio and production lawyers who drafted these illegal contracts and the executives that covered this up were not,” attorney Freedman told Deadline this morning on this latest suit from his firm and Garagos. “They knew exactly what they were doing by creating these illegal contractural provisions and secretly hiding the illegality in an effort to silence these participants,” the big swinging lawyer added. “It is all part of the ecosystem of Reality TV.
“These agreements are being used as swords to threaten people to keep them silent and also as shields to hide their illegality behind a signature and an attitude of saying ‘well you signed it,’” Freedman went on to state. “Suing Renee for 4 million dollars based on an illegal liquidated damages provision when she made a total of $8,000 is not only unconscionable but will turn out to be the mistake that opens up the Pandora’s Reality TV box.”
With NBCU having already walked it back on their Reality TV NDA’s for Bravo shows and others, and promising to hold their unscripted series to a high standard, Freedman and Garagos’ Poche suit could be the tip of the Sword of Damocles for producers, cable nets and streamers.”
“We have hundreds of clients standing by,” Freedman threatens.
Neither Netflix nor Delirium TV responded to request for comment on Poche’s suit. If and when they do, this post will be updated.
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