CALGARY – CHUM Radio’s Energy 101.5 has launched an experiment/promotion that will culminate in two strangers tying the knot on-air.
“We want to prove that love is blind,” the station’s program director Rob Mise told Cartt.ca about Two Strangers and a Wedding. “This is not a marketing contest. It’s a social experiment” he continues, “Caller six, isn’t going to win a wedding.”
This is just a non-traditional approach to finding someone, Mise adds, offering that the applicants are just normal people trying to find love. “We’ve touched a nerve among listeners,” he says noting that several people have tried to find love on social networking sites, going out or through friends, and that this is just another approach.
The bride and groom will not meet (or see a picture of each other) until their on-air nuptials. The closest they’ll come to seeing each other will be a masqueraded trip to acquire their marriage license mere days before the big event. The legal ceremony will take place on Thursday, October 30 at 7:30 a.m. at The Atco Centre at Canada Olympic Park. It will be broadcast live on Energy 101.5’s morning show Freeway and Meg in the Morning.
The couple will then be chaperoned on their 12-day Australian honeymoon by one of the station’s senior managers. They will be offered separate rooms, if needed.
All semi-final candidates are checked out thoroughly. Think criminal background checks, medical examinations (including blood tests), personality tests and even chats with ex-flames on-air. Then there are the experts that weigh in on the decision: wedding expert Lisa M. Hanslip, psychologist Dr. Ron Dougan, matchmaker Maureen Wagner, psychic and spiritual advisor Kjarlune Rae and marriage counselor Sheldon Walker.
The bride has already been selected from 50 entries and the groom applicants are now being screened for her. Monday’s bride, as she is known, is a 34-year-old caseworker that works with people with disabilities. Only a few details are known about her, but she has been interviewed on air.
Her groom will be selected by the panel of experts and the voting listeners, and yes, the bride can actually participate in this process.
Listeners can blog their thoughts on the stations’ web site, www.energy1015.com, or even follow wedding updates with planner Hanslip as she runs through festivities.
Arranged marriages over the air waves isn’t new. This sort of courting has come via similar contests in Australia, the United Kingdom, New Zealand, the U.S. and other parts of Europe. If history repeats itself, expect the bride and groom to turn into local celebrities.
Detractors claim we’re “making a mockery of marriage,” say Mise, but we’re out to prove that love is actually just blind.
Tara Blasco Raj is Cartt.ca’s Western Editor.
