Did Adam and Claire cheat? MAFS Australia cheating scandal begins
This week, UK viewers of Married at First Sight Australia get their first look at this series’s cheating scandal, which will slowly build after a dramatic night out causes accusations to fly.
The big question is, did Adam and Claire actually cheat on Jesse and Janelle? Well, read on to find out…
A cheating scandal! Just what every good series of Married at First Sight needs.
As Episode 8 begins tonight on E4, we start with a phone recording of Jesse, taken at 1:15am back at his apartment. It’s not often we get to see footage taken by the participants themselves, but this late-night drama happened far away from MAFS’ cameras and producers.
“Holy shit. Big ******* drama. I just lost my shit,” Jesse says. “I literally was at a point where I could not control my anger.
“I’m not happy. Like why the f**k would you do that?”
As we learn over the course of the episode, a bunch of this year’s cast headed out for the night, away from the cameras and producers who track their every move during the day.
At least Jesse, Adam, Lyndall, Duncan and Claire were there, and something big went down.
Jesse explains that throughout the night, Claire was constantly leaning in to Adam, touching his arm and shoulders, and the two seemed to be getting on a little bit better than Jesse would have liked.
Then, Claire and Adam left the table together, headed outside… and Claire never came back!
When Claire arrived back at her and Jesse’s apartment later, she had the phone on loudspeaker, and Jesse heard what he describes as a “big, bellowing laugh, a typical Adam-like laugh.”
Yet when Jesse asked Claire who she was on the phone to, he tells us that she looked panicked, went, “oh, sorry, girls, sorry girls,” and hung up the phone.
Believing that Claire was lying and that she was actually talking to Adam, Jesse immediately stormed to Adam’s room and demanded that he show him his phone. Janelle had no idea what was happening as an enraged Jesse took the opportunity to tell her that she’s with a snake, before he walked away.
The following morning, Janelle doesn’t seem to have any worries about her own husband, despite what went down.
In fact, she and Adam joke about the events, with Adam commenting that he’s sure that Claire “fancies me more than she fancies him.”
Claire, on the other hand, is just embarrassed that her husband “caused an absolute scene,” and feels bad that Adam and Janelle had someone banging on their door at midnight.
“The way he demanded to see my phone, I will not tolerate that. No way, get the f***k out of here,” she says in one of the show’s cut-away interviews. “You don’t own me. No-one has anything to answer for other than Jesse. No-one.”
But – despite Claire and Adam’s remarkable calm, and their insistence that they did nothing wrong – there’s a twist, and it’ll be weeks before it’s fully revealed.
Jesse was right to be worried, as something did happen between the pair at that party!
In next Monday’s episode, we get the first commitment ceremony, and Lyndall goes into it ready to unleash a bombshell.
“I have information that I want to bring up at the commitment ceremony,” she tells producers. “This was something that I hoped I could just take this to the grave. But there are things that I saw that I didn’t agree with. I owe it to myself to be honest about what I heard.
“If I said nothing, I will feel guilty about this forever.”
Adam and Claire, who’ve been protesting their innocence since the secret night out, are about to have some of the truth exposed.
In front of all the other participants, Adam calls Jesse out for being paranoid, telling him “what you did on Saturday night was not on. Trying to put a wedge between me and Janelle. You’ve got issues, mate, I’m sorry.”
At the same commitment ceremony, Claire reveals she was on the phone to her friends.
She even gets an alibi when Cameron confirms that he was on the phone to Adam when all of this was going down – meaning Claire couldn’t have been!
Damn, it seems Jesse was in the wrong all along. He accepts that nothing was going on and that he overreacted.
Until Lyndall interrupts, and out comes the bombshell:
“I don’t think Jesse was entirely wrong in what he assumed… I may have misheard, but when I picked up my things to go, Adam turned to me and he said, don’t go. You know that if you go, I’m gonna go home with Claire.”
Jesse is delighted – or as delighted as one can be to learn that another man wanted to go home with his wife.
Adam defends himself by admitting that, while there was flirty banter throughout the night, he never would have said something as direct as that. Claire accepts that she’s a warm person who may have lent over Adam while chatting to him, but that nothing more than that happened.
Adam apologises to everyone, and to Janelle. She admits that the whole experience has made her feel more insecure, but still feels like she’s gradually falling for Adam, and as decision time arrives, the pair both put stay.
In the first big shock of the season, Jesse chooses to leave. However, Claire chooses to stay, giving them at least another week in the competition.
While that seems like the end of it, the saga is far from over. We won’t get the full story for another few weeks, but it eventually transpires that Claire and Adam kissed at the party after leaving the others to go for a vape.
The secret almost gets blown open during Confessions Week, as we get Adam and Janelle’s challenge. They have to hand over one of their most prized possessions – their phone!
They have to share their most recent correspondence with family and friends about their marriage and their partner. Eek.
In a remarkable bit of gaslighting and manipulation that would make certain other participants proud, Adam claims that he finds the task “a bit intrusive and stuff.”
He claims he doesn’t feel the need to look at Janelle’s phone, and wouldn’t want to end up reading into something that wasn’t there… especially in light of Jesse’s jealousy from the other night!
In a remarkable twist, Janelle likes the fact that Adam has no desire to see her phone, and agrees that it shows more trust in each other if they don’t look at each other’s phones! And so they don’t!
For the love of god.
So, get ready for both Jesse and Claire, and Adam and Janelle, to play happy families for the next few weeks.
Jesse opens up to Claire over his jealousy issues, she forgives him, they move back into the same apartment, and they suddenly become one of the show’s most promising couples. Remarkable.
Nine / Channel 4
Yet the truth, as always, comes out.
Eventually, the guilt gets too much for Claire. She confesses to Sandy that she’s been racked with guilt, and tells her all about the kiss she and Adam shared on the night out. Then, she tells Jesse.
“I’ve broken your trust and that night that we all went out and Adam and I went outside, and we kissed,” she finally admits.
The revelation just causes Jesse to burst into laughter, as he says, “that is classic. I just knew it.”
With other participants knowing about it, Adam is forced to tell his wife the truth.
“So, on that night out that we all went out and got smashed,” Adam explains. “To me, it was absolutely nothing, me and Claire had a little kiss downstairs.”
As you do. No drama.
Nine / Channel 4
Telling Janelle that they’d previously argued and that they weren’t in a good place, Adam seems to dismiss the notion that he did anything wrong.
So, with the truth set to be exposed, will we soon see the end of two Married at First Sight Australia couples for 2023?
In short, yes. Janelle and Adam leave in the commitment ceremony directly after the truth about the kiss comes out, in an episode set to air on Monday 3rd April.
Jesse and Claire persevere for a few more weeks, before parting ways at the beginning of the show’s seventh week, meaning we’ve still got them on our screens for a while yet.
Married at First Sight Australia airs on E4 and All4, Monday–Thursday at 7:30pm.
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