See full version: How To Get A Job On Below Deck
In early 2020, Diana Wallace, casting director for Below Deck season eight, uploaded a casting call to her Instagram page. The post read: "Now casting experienced yachties with SAILING EXPERIENCE! Send your CV + a photo to dianawallacecasting@gmail.com, or tag your sailor friends below!" here
If you're a fan of Bravo's Below Deck, you've probably wondered how the cast got jobs on the famous sailing yacht in the first place. And with tips reportedly around $12,000 per employee per charter, we can't help but wonder the same thing. Surprisingly, it's easier than you think, but you need to be aware that you'll be a member of the cast and potentially be filmed too. more
Ultimately, to get a job on Below Deck, you need to have experience working on a yacht. If you head to the Below Deck and Below Deck Meditteranean official casting application, you'll see that you not only need to write a brief bio about yourself and your yachting experience, but you also need to provide a detailed history of your experience level plus upload any and all relevant certificates. Not only that, you have to upload a current photo of yourself and introduce yourself with a short video, showing off your personality.
Last but not least, and perhaps most importantly, you must be over the age of 21 and agree to the eligibility and release requirements as per the fine print. You are not simply applying for a standard yacht job or standard reality TV job. You are expected to balance the two, working just as you would on a yacht while being followed by a camera crew for all the world to see. [links]
He has posted a series of positive messages during the early days of the pandemic. Just a few days after arriving home, he shot footage from his bike. In the caption, the Bravo star bluntly wrote: “Everybody just needs to do what is right. You can never go wrong doing the right thing. WTFU. Now is the time. This is something you can’t phone in. Do the right thing and do it now.” more
The crew was in disbelief over the news on their phones. It felt like there was a whole other, scary world outside of yachting. Earlier this season, Captain Lee told E! News that they felt isolated. [links]
“Everybody needs to do their part,” Lee continued in his post. “Stay safe. Do your social distancing and hang in there.” here
Often, unexpected events and emergencies happen in yachting. But they usually have more time to prepare. But since the COVID-19 pandemic was so unprecedented, they didn’t know what to do. He reiterated that the crew felt isolated.
“There was just a lot of different things this year, because of the circumstances in which we had to film,” he continued. “A lot of things we’re used to doing, we couldn’t do because we had to stay within the confines of our bubble because of COVID, so we had to improvise in some situations, which is not a bad thing. Sometimes you can improvise and get extremely creative, which I like to think we’re pretty good at.” [links]
“I am much better,” he said. “The timing was mainly screwed up. Because we have such a tight shooting schedule, it was imperative that the guests’ charters start and end on time so it didn’t have a domino effect and impact every charter after that.” more
The Captain’s absence won’t be the only shakeup Below Deck faces in Season 9. Former cast members and occasional rivals First Officer Eddie Lucas and Chef Rachel Hargrove, while seven new yachties are joining the show: Chief Stewardess Heather Chase, stews Jessica Albert and Fraser Olender, and deckhands Jake Foulger, Rayna Lindsay, and Wes O’Dell. While Captain Lee is gone, Captain Sean Meagher will helm My Seanna. [links]
Don’t worry, Below Deck fans — Captain Lee Rosbach will be back! When the trailer for Season 9 of the Bravo reality show dropped, many viewers were shocked to learn that the beloved captain will be absent from part of the season due to a “condition.” Luckily, he confirmed in a new interview with E! News that he’ll eventually return to the season in better spirits.
Captain Lee clarified that his condition wasn’t COVID-related, and teased that Season 9 is “unlike any other season that we’ve had.”
Below Deck premieres Monday, October 25, at 9/8c on Bravo and streams the next day on Peacock. If you want to catch up on recent episodes, Season 8 of Below Deck will arrive on Peacock on September 25. In the meantime, you can watch the full trailer for Season 9 above. [links]
“I have to admit, this season’s been pretty hard on me,” said Captain Sandy, still in her uniform and speaking via Zoom from her quarters. “For me, the last thing I want to do is fire anybody. That’s never been a thing for me. Probably in all the years I’ve worked on boats, maybe I’ve fired seven to 10 people.”
A little backstory about Captain Sandy: The Florida native has spent the past 30 years rising through the ranks of a male-dominated industry, overcoming drug and alcohol addiction, stage-two cancer, and literal pirates (in the Red Sea; google it) along the way. When she was approached by Bravo, Below Deck was looked down upon by serious industry members. Captain Sandy had never watched the program. But she is a believer in God and paying her good fortune forward. When she had been directionless and “unemployable” after dropping out of high school and bouncing between “jails and institutions” for eight years, she said someone had invested in her. With Below Deck, she saw an opportunity to reach audiences—enlightening them about the maritime industry, sharing the importance of investing in people, and hopefully inspiring viewers by being her bad-ass, in-charge self along the way.
“I forgive Tom. It happens. If [his meltdowns] would’ve been in the beginning of the season, I probably would’ve fired Tom and hired another chef because he was so rude and awful. He was terrible, but I had mad respect for his food…. But you know what? He came from an 80-meter, he’s used to a sous chef…. It’s a lot to cook for the crew, cook for the client. They never get rest.”