Married At First Sight has introduced us to some truly awful grooms over the years.
From serial cheaters to master manipulators and the men who think saying ‘I’m a nice guy’ excuses their entitlement. But Tim Gromie? He makes them all look like saints.
Tim isn’t just the worst groom MAFS has ever seen – and his behaviour on screen really speaks for itself – but according to my sources, he’s a walking red flag.
His conduct on MAFS so far has been bad enough, but when you add in what I’ve heard from insiders, including producers who’ve had to deal with him, it’s clear: Tim is the poster child for everything wrong with modern dating.
No wonder he’s still single.
It all started off so well, or at least it seemed to. Tim and his bride, Katie Johnstone, had vows that aligned almost perfectly.
Tim Gromie (pictured) makes Married At First Sight villains of previous seasons look like saints by comparison, according to MAFS expert and entertainment journalist Ali Daher
Tim isn’t just the worst groom MAFS has ever seen – and his behaviour on screen really speaks for itself – but according to my sources, he’s a walking red flag
They wanted the same things in a partner, they shared similar values, and for a vanishingly brief moment, it looked like this could actually work.
Then Tim wiped away their first kiss like it was an unfortunate sneeze.
I knew it was coming – I know every cough and spit that happens this season from staking out the weddings, honeymoons and homestays. Yet still, it was awful to watch.
Katie, bless her heart, tried to stay positive, but Tim made it clear from the get-go he wasn’t attracted to her.
And let’s remember, he’s no oil painting either. He’s overweight, his tattoos are cringe and he’s barrelling towards middle age with a vengeance.
Then, when she attempted to hug him, he recoiled. When she tried to engage him in conversation, he shut her down.
When they posed for wedding photos, he acted like a hostage. I’ve seen plenty of wedding day awkwardness during my years reporting on MAFS, but this was different; to me, this felt like calculated cruelty.
At the reception, Katie held out hope that he’d loosen up. He didn’t.
Tim’s rejection of his ‘wife’ Katie Johnson came across like calculated cruelty, writes Ali Daher
Instead, he spent most of the night avoiding her like she was an energy bill he didn’t want to pay.
And when it came time to cut the wedding cake, his disinterest and rudeness left her humiliated in front of her friends and family.
But, as is so often this case with Married At First Sight, Tim’s behaviour on screen wasn’t just the result of a ‘bad edit’.
A woman slid into my DMs claiming she had matched with Tim on the dating app Bumble just before Married At First Sight went to air.
For context, he had filmed the show and was waiting for it to premiere. Back in the day, MAFS participants would at least try to keep a low profile so as not to spoil the outcome of the series, but Tim, it seems, couldn’t help himself.
He allegedly made a jarring remark about how his date was too tall, and she’d be more appealing to him if she were shorter.
This aligns with comments he said on MAFS about preferring ‘short, petite’ women.
Furthermore, the date said he didn’t look like his photos. I have obtained images of Tim from when he was slimmer and younger that appear to be the ones he used on dating apps.
I spoke to another woman who claims she encountered Tim at a dating event in Melbourne. He had allegedly been drinking and couldn’t help bragging about his upcoming appearance on MAFS.
Tim said on MAFS he prefers ‘petite’ blondes. Dates who have encountered him in real life say he does indeed have a height preference, and also allegedly uses old photos of himself that don’t reflect his current appearance
Worse yet, he allegedly called his partner, since revealed to be Katie, a ‘tall, heavy redhead’ and made it clear he had zero interest in her from the start.
He complained to the woman at the dating event that producers had ‘tricked’ him into staying in a tent for seven hours after the wedding before he was allowed to attend the dinner party, where ‘everyone was very, very rude’.
When the woman wouldn’t indulge his ego, he allegedly lost patience and walked off.
And then there’s the leaked Instagram messages everyone is talking about.
While still on honeymoon week with Katie, Tim slid into former MAFS contestant Eden Harper’s DMs late at night, whining about how he wasn’t into his match.
His biggest gripe? She wasn’t a ‘short, blonde, petite woman’. (Where have we heard that before? Evidently, Tim thought MAFS was a Build-a-Bride workshop.)
More than one woman I spoke to claimed he ‘rated’ women out of 10 based on their appearance
MAFS villains come and go, but the reason why I – and many viewers – find Tim’s behaviour so utterly infuriating is because it’s textbook entitlement.
He went into the experiment expecting a woman custom-built to his specifications. When that didn’t happen, he treated Katie like she was some kind of clerical error.
Even worse, he refuses to take responsibility for his own bad behaviour.
He allegedly told one woman he felt ‘set up’ by producers. He also allegedly tried to pin some of the blame on Katie, claiming they had an agreement to be just friends, only for her to ‘blindside’ him at the commitment ceremony.
And now he’s deleted his social media and refuses to do interviews with media.
So, a victim complex to add to his long list of sins.
And as if his behaviour on screen (and alleged behaviour off screen) wasn’t already bad enough, sources close to production tell me Tim has been desperate to get on Married At First Sight for years.
A casting producer confirmed he had applied multiple times, spending the last three years trying to land a spot on the top-rating Nine show.
But it gets better: I hear Tim also applied for The Bachelor and The Bachelorette, reportedly bragging to his MAFS co-stars he was ‘almost cast’. Yeah, right.
It seems Tim didn’t join MAFS looking for love – he joined looking for airtime.
And now he’s got it, he has squandered every second with his toxic behaviour, and viewers are absolutely appalled.
There’s been more than a hundred men participate in Married At First Sight since the show’s premiere. I’ve met most of them, as well as stars of the UK and US versions.
Over the years, MAFS has given us some legendary villains from Sam Ball and Harrison Boon to Dean Wells and Bryce Ruthven.
We’ve had cheaters, manipulators, and grooms who’ve just checked out completely.
But even the most diabolical of those villains had some redeeming qualities.
Sure, Sam was a prick to Lizzie, but he’s kept his head down since and was accepted into the Royal Australian Regiment. Bryce may have been stringing along a ‘secret girlfriend’ on season eight, but since falling for Melissa he’s become a dedicated dad to their twin boys. Likewise, Harrison is a great father. And Dean? Well, he’s Dean.
But Tim? It’s early days, but from what I’ve seen and heard, I have absolutely nothing positive to say about the man. Going by the show, and what women have told me, he looks to be a toxic mix of entitlement, arrogance and outdated views on women.
If there’s any justice in the world, we’ll never have to see him on reality TV – or dating apps – ever again.
