Below Deck Sailing Yacht: Emma Crouch Isn’t The Villain (Is Producer Interference Making Her Look Bad?)
Below Deck Sailing Yacht: Emma Crouch Isn’t The Villain (Is Producer Interference Making Her Look Bad?)
New deckhand Emma Crouch is under fire on Below Deck Sailing Yacht season 5, but producer interference could be to blame for her burgeoning villain edit. Below Deck Sailing Yacht season 5 is well underway, with Chief Stew Daisy Kelliher dealing with the fallout of her relationship with former Chief Engineer Colin Macrae and troubled First Mate Gary King. She’s also feuding with Stew Diana Cruz and dealing with flirty Stew Danni Warren. However, Emma might have gotten the worst edit yet.
Gary’s reputation was marred by his sexual misconduct allegations during filming in Sardinia, Italy, in 2022. According to former Bravo employee Samantha Suarez, Gary made her uncomfortable with his drunken advances after she was asked to accompany him back to his room by production. She was able to escape but was still understandably shaken by the situation. Gary wasn’t adequately disciplined by production and still appears as a main character in Below Deck Sailing Yacht season 5. Could Emma be the scapegoat for Gary’s previous bad behavior?
Emma Crouch Has An Impressive Resume
Gary Makes Her Seem Incompetent
Gary makes it seem like Emma is a completely green beginner on Below Deck Sailing Yacht, but she had plenty of experience before appearing on the hit Bravo show. In addition to her job as a deckhand aboard the Parsifal III, she serves as a trainer with Paper Boat Yacht Academy, offering courses across global locations such as the Dominican Republic, Greece, and New York.
Emma’s career also includes extensive experience working on superyachts, where she has held roles as both a stew and a deckhand. She’s even a certified EMT, meaning she’s equipped to handle emergency medical situations onboard. However, the show makes her look completely incompetent and clueless about yachting life.
Emma’s adventurous lifestyle is matched by her passion for travel and nature, another usual trait of many yachties in the Below Deck franchise. According to Emma‘s Instagram, her work and personal explorations have taken her to destinations worldwide, including South Africa, Greece, Ibiza, and Costa Rica. Unless Emma is a producer plant, she was chosen for the job because she knows what she’s doing and shares the usual priorities of Below Deck crew members.
Gary King Is Trying To Make Emma Look Bad
His Sexism Is Showing
Gary is purposefully trying to make Emma look bad to deflect from his own bad behavior on Below Deck Sailing Yacht season 5 and beyond. From the outset, Gary had it out for Emma. He damaged a tender because he was too busy flirting with a dancer hired for a guest event, showcasing his usual weakness for women. However, when Emma accidentally didn’t tie up a tender properly, leading to potential safety issues, Gary threw a fit.
Gary was biased against Emma from the start of the charter season.
The deck crew aboard the Parsifal III is admittedly small, made up of only Gary, Emma, and Deckhand Keith Allen. Therefore, a priority on teamwork and communication are paramount. However, instead of teaching Emma how Gary liked to do things on the sailing yacht, he only complained when she did things differently or wasn’t sure what she was doing. He immediately wrote her off as incompetent and lazy, despite Emma’s desire to do her job.
Is Production Protecting Gary?
They Want Him To Have A Good Edit
Emma is being used as a scapegoat to give Gary a hero edit. Below Deck Sailing Yacht had already filmed season 5 when allegations of Gary’s offscreen misconduct surfaced. Despite fan pushback, it would have been a gigantic waste of money for Bravo producers to scrap the filmed season, fire Gary, and wait for the next charter season. Therefore, production had to be strategic about how Gary was portrayed. While Gary claimed that he was edited out of the season, production had other tricks up their sleeve to make fans forget about Gary’s woes.
