The mid-2000s was when reality TV really started to take mainstream audiences by storm and VH1 had a huge hand in that. With their "celebreality" lineup, they had audiences hooked and dating shows like Flavor of Love and its various spin-offs, like Rock of Love and Charm School seemed like they were going to be a staple of the network for the forseeable future.
But after their final show, Megan Wants a Millionaire, was cancelled abruptly in the middle of its first season, VH1 completely dropped their dating shows and the way reality TV is cast was changed forever.
What was Megan Wants a Millionaire About?
Megan Hauserman rose to VH1 fame on the second season of Rock of Love, a series in which 20 women competed to win the heart of 80s rockstar Bret Michaels.
Although she came in fifth place and was eliminated due to a lack of connection with the rockstar, she went on to compete on I Love Money in order to try to win a cash prize and then moved on to Rock of Love: Charm School to fulfill her goal of being a "trophy wife."
After she won over audiences on those shows, Megan Hauserman was given her own spin-off show, Megan Wants a Millionaire, where she would be the one letting men compete to win her heart for a change instead of the other way around.
According to Megan, she was looking for a "stable" man and described her dream guy as "a mature guy that can handle me and doesn't cry." According to a 2008 casting call, VH1 was looking for men with a net worth of over $1 million to compete and when the show started filming, 17 men gathered together in Encino, California to film the show.
Why was Megan Wants a Millionaire canceled?
Megan Wants a Millionaire was abruptly cancelled after the third episode aired when news broke that an arrest warrant had been issued for Ryan Jenkins, one of the men who was competing on the show.
In August 2009, the body of model Jasmine Fiore was discovered inside a suitcase and according to the police, the only person of interest was her husband, Ryan Jenkins. The pair had gotten married in Las Vegas shortly after filming for Megan Wants a Millionaire wrapped and Fiore's family reported that the two of them had a tumultuous relationship, with Jenkins regularly being incredibly jealous and controlling over her life and relationships with other people.
Two days before the discovery of her body, the two of them checked into a hotel together and were going to be attending a charity poker tournament. The two were spotted on security cameras leaving the hotel, but Jenkins was seen a few hours later coming back alone and Fiore wasn't seen alive again.
On August 19, four days after Fiore's body was discovered and on the day that it was positively identified as her through the serial number on her breast implants, VH1 put Megan Wants a Millionaire on hiatus out of respect for Fiore's family, having only aired three episodes.
Two days later, after Ryan Jenkins was named as the sole person of interest in her death, VH1 made the decision to formally cancel the show and the show's existence was wiped from VH1's website, on-demand cable services, and online video purchasing platforms like the iTunes store. VH1 also chose to never air I Love Money 3 due to the fact that Ryan Jenkins had appeared as a contestant and was reportedly the grand prize winner of the show.
Jenkins was found in a hotel room having taken his own life in a hotel following the news that he was named as a person of interest in the murder and no other suspects were named in the investigation.
How Megan Wants a Millionaire changed reality TV casting forever
The news that a contestant on a VH1 reality show had brutally taken his wife's life shook the entertainment world.
Reports later came out that Jenkins, who was a Canadian real estate investor, had a criminal record in Canada and had been convicted of an assault in his home country two years prior to this event. According to VH1, the private company they used to conduct background searches only checked records in the United States, meaning that this conviction was never disclosed to the producers.
At the time of Megan Wants a Millionaire's filming, every network had their own process for how they conducted interviews and screenings for potential contestants and each hired their own individual background check companies to do private checks on them.
Mark Cronin, co-founder of the production company that brought Megan Wants a Millionaire to life, went on to continue his career in reality TV and eventually created Bravo's Below Deck. Cronin spoke to Entertainment Weekly about how his experience with the tragedy that got Megan Wants a Millionaire canceled changed the way he handles not just casting people for shows, but how producers now handle relationships with the stars after they leave the show.
"We keep an eye on them. We had a woman on Below Deck who needed psychological counseling after the show… There were danger signs, she was crying out for help in different ways, and we made sure she got professional counseling," Cronin told EW about the added diligence that comes from casting and maintaining contact with reality TV stars following this tragedy.
According to Jodi Wincheski, who is in charge of casting for Survivor, putting this level of effort into vetting every potential cast member means that shows can miss out on "amazing" potential contestants, but producers and casting directors aren't willing to take risks on anyone who might be showing signs that they're not a good fit for reality TV.