She says she signed up for Married At First Sight genuinely hoping to find love, but all Ines Basic got from the experiment was a bad reputation.
Already under the microscope for her behaviour towards husband Bronson Norrish, Ines flirted her way to reality TV infamy after embarking on an affair with another groom, Sam Ball.
A very Hollywood-like arrival to a March court appearance for a DUI didn’t help her case either.
Now, roughly three months on, Ines, 29, is attempting to get her life back on track after it was spectacularly derailed by the ratings juggernaut. However, that’s proving easier said than done.
“I’m looking forward to putting it behind me,” she tells NW magazine. “I went into the show the most excited I’d been in a while but as filming unfolded I became more and more disappointed. I just didn’t like how controlled and manipulated I felt.”
“There were a lot of times I was showing my softer side, but it was never shown. There were also plenty of laughs, particularly with Bronson.”
Ines isn’t the first member of the MAFS cast to speak out about feeling manipulated. Lauren Huntriss, who was married to 29-year-old virgin Matthew Bennett, claimed producers orchestrated the conversation where she told her husband she “used to be a lesbian.”
”Producers will go to extreme lengths to tell a story and they will edit you, manipulate you in any way that they can to tell that story,” she said.
Despite their rocky relationship on screen, Ines says she and Bronson had a lot of laughs behind the scenes.
Although she was apologetically herself on the show, Ines feel like people didn’t get to see the real her.
“It feels like MAFS is stunting my growth, because people expect me to be the person they saw on the show when really that was 10 percent of the real me.”
The legal secretary is keen to move on from the whole experience. “I’m looking forward to turning my attentions to other projects,” she says.
One of those projects includes collaborating with a friend on a T-shirt line. “I’ve always used fashion as a way to express myself and have always wanted to be a fashion designer,” she reveals.
And along with a new career comes a new look. At the height of the stress of the show, it was reported that Ines had lost 12kg and weighed just 41kg at the reunion episode. Friends were worried about her state of mind and she was said to be suffering from post traumatic stress after receiving a barrage of online abuse.
A friend of Ines’ told Woman’s Day at the time that she had cut herself off from friends and castmates, and was “living like a recluse” in her Brisbane home.
“Losing weight when I’m highly stressed is not hard,” Ines says. “I had the roughest time on MAFS, filming was really demanding and I had a lot of personal dramas just before the reunion was shot.”
Ines’ affair with Sam propelled her into reality TV infamy.
While Ines has since put most of the weight back on, she’s also had a fair amount of cosmetic work done.
“I get Botox done on my forehead, crow’s feet and for my frown. I also get lip fillers and advanced skin treatments, like lasering,” she reveals.
She has also debuted a new set of veneers courtesy of celebrity dentist Dr Dee, the same dentist who transformed Jessika Power’s smile.
As to the question of love, Ines says she’s ruled it out for the foreseeable future.
“I have no desire to start dating again,” she says. “I’m happy being by myself for now. I never want to rely on a man to survive.”
