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“Below Deck Mediterranean,” a reality TV show about a crew that works on a charter yacht cruising the Amalfi Coast of Italy, recently hit its highest-rated episode of the series to date with four women from the Hamptons aboard the luxurious mega-yacht.
Lizzz Kritzer of Kritzer Marketing was the primary guest, invited aboard the ship by none other than the captain herself, Captain Sandy Yawns. She brought along three friends, Michelle Reilly, co-owner of Herbst & Rist Liquor on Jobs Lane in Southampton Village, Amy Musto, a local artist, and Danielle Lise Desrochers, a real estate agent with Douglas Elliman in Bridgehampton.
Ms. Kritzer first met Captain Sandy in Miami Beach. “We were introduced and I was so impressed to meet a female boat captain. You don’t see that many female boaters, so we became fast friends,” she said, noting also that Captain Sandy wasn’t yet on “Below Deck Mediterranean” when they met.
This is not Ms. Kritzer’s first brush with reality television, as she rented her Southampton residence to Kourtney and Khloé Kardashian for the filming of “Kourtney & Khloé Take the Hamptons” in 2014. “So they literally took the Hamptons in my house,” she laughed.
The entire yachting trip takes place over two nights and three days, with cameras on the crew and the guests the entire time. Ms. Kritzer said the filming is something you can’t ignore, as the microphones are required to stay on your person all the time except when in your cabin. “The second you walk out of your cabin there’s somebody waiting for you with a big camera. If by chance somehow you sneak out, there are cameras all over the boat, they find you, within 30 seconds there’s a cameraman waiting for you,” she said.
While it may be impossible to ignore the cameras, it is simultaneously impossible not enjoy the 188-foot yacht. “It’s real. It’s the best wine, the biggest lobsters, anything you want, your wildest dreams,” she said. “As the primary, I had a cabin that I have never seen anything as large as on a yacht. It had a private office before you even enter the cabin, it was pretty awesome.”
The four guests began their trip in Naples, sailing for three days along the coast of Italy. They stopped for excursions in Procida and Ischia, including a church tour and a luncheon atop a mountain.
As for the necessary reality TV drama among the crew, Ms. Kritzer said she and her friends didn’t know a single thing going on out of their sight. “You never see it. Maybe I had a slight little concept because of being friends with Sandy, like I knew she wasn’t thrilled with [chief stew] Hannah [Ferrier], but you really don’t know.”
She also said the producers had asked her if she wanted to talk about Conrad Empson, bosun on the yacht, but she refused, guessing that they wanted her to say something negative as the show tried to paint him as the villain.
“We had nothing negative to say. Everybody could not have been more accommodating,” she said. “From watching the show, you know [the crew] wakes up in the morning and they’re like, ‘Oh God, I’m still drunk,’ but I’m thinking, ‘Wow, when we walked on this boat everyone was sharp and beautiful and crisp.’”
She added that the situation reminded her a bit of the popular show “Downton Abbey”—the people are all working the house for its owners, yet they never know the drama that goes on behind those closed doors. “I think Captain Sandy doesn’t even know everything that’s going on. When they all go out and get drunk and they’re partying, she’s not there,” she said.
On whether she would agree to being a guest on the yacht again, the answer was an immediate yes. “The second I got off the boat, having not even seen how they edited it, I said I would do this again knowing what I know now,” she said.
The discount on chartering the yacht and a trip around the Mediterranean in October when they filmed certainly didn’t hurt the appeal of going on the show again. “I think it would be even more enjoyable because I know what to expect!”
To watch episode 12 of “Below Deck Mediterranean,” visit bravotv.com.
on Aug 14, 2018