As the star of "The Bachelorette," Minnesota teacher Michelle Young had a tricky task: Find and fall in love with your soul mate on national television, sorting through a host of drama to end the show with him, engaged.
Oh, and convince him to move to Minnesota.
On Tuesday night, during an emotional finale, Young did it. She got engaged to the man she called her "soul-Nayte" — Nayte Olukoya, a Winnipeg-raised, Austin, Texas-based sales representative. The pair are house-hunting in Minnesota with the help of a surprise $200,000 "down payment" from the ABC franchise.
Along the way, her love story has become America's love story, one this pop culture touchstone has never before told: For the first time, a Black lead gave the final rose to a Black contestant.
"For us, it's just so incredibly important that we were able to show so many people a Black love story," Young told the Hollywood Reporter.
The day after their engagement aired, the couple talked with the Star Tribune about filming in Minnesota, the importance of airing difficult conversations and whether "Miss Young," as she's known to her fifth-graders at Echo Park Elementary in Burnsville, plans to return to the classroom. The conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
Q: I want to start with the most important question: Do your dogs get along?
Michelle: Nayte's dog Percy is incredibly excited about having a stepbrother. On the other hand, Chief is like, "Who invited this guy?" It's going to take him a minute. But they are warming up to each other.
Nayte: Percy just doesn't know boundaries. He's 9 months old. He's a little puppy and just 100% unfazed. He's just like: No man, I want to be your friend.
Michelle: He has no choice. Kill him with kindness.
Q: Seriously, though, this process must have been such a whirlwind. What have you learned about one another since getting engaged?
Nayte: I don't know if there have been any big surprises other than just how alike we are. Every other day, something will happen and we realize, wow, we are so alike. It's kind of crazy.
One thing that was really refreshing is that it's almost literally impossible for us to get bored. Because we're not allowed to be in public, right? We have a lot of time in the house together. And just not once have we ever been bored, which is amazing.
Q: Why was it important to film in Minnesota?
Michelle: You're trying to learn about these men, and you're also trying to show them who you are in the quickest way possible, because you're looking for an engagement, you're looking to fall in love.
And what better way to do that than to go back to your hometown, your stomping grounds? That week was this amazing reset where I could talk with my parents, talk with some of my friends and get that support that I'm typically used to having while I was starting to navigate these stronger emotions.
Q: You're house-hunting here. Do you want to be in Minnesota long-term?
Michelle: We are looking for houses — aggressively looking for houses.
Q: Will you keep teaching?
Michelle: I will be back in the classroom Jan. 3 to finish out the school year.
For me, it's important that I'm always in a line of work or doing something impactful or that I'm passionate about. Right now, that's in the classroom. And in the future, I'm getting my master's. I have always wanted to go into school administration, and that's something that I see myself still doing.
But also I know that there are other opportunities coming. If that is doing something else for a little while, where I'm still able to have that impact, great.
Q: How do you feel the show treated your story? Being a biracial, Black woman, did you have concerns about this franchise, which has been criticized for its handling of race, getting it right?
Michelle: Before even accepting the position, I talked with the producers about wanting to have those difficult conversations that had begun during the last season of "The Bachelor." I had been through some personal experiences, and there's a lot also that I had recently been through with everything taking place in Minnesota with George Floyd.
I wanted to make sure that the producers knew that this is going to be a strong part of my story — because it's a part of who I am. Those are the conversations that I need to have to really progress a relationship.
That's something that I laid out very clearly before entering, and that's something that they also wanted for the franchise, as well.
Q: Nayte posted on Instagram about the comments you've gotten about your "red flags." Were those concerns that you ever had, Michelle?
Michelle: The show is just such a snippet of a relationship. Red flags are different for everybody. But if I felt like Nayte was a questionable person, I wouldn't have continued the relationship. Anybody who I didn't trust, I sent home.
With Nayte, he was this man who hasn't been in love before, who hasn't been vulnerable before, but who was also very upfront with working through all of that. You would love for someone to come on the show and just lay it all out there. Like, wouldn't we all love that? But that's really not how it works.
I think the audience really got to see a man who was truly challenging himself to open up.
Even on our overnight, I really saw that when he was given that time — not the 15-minute cocktail party or the 10-minute interruption on a group date — we could work through that conversation and his emotions together. I really did get what I needed.
And, hey, if he's a walking red flag, then he is my walking red flag. [She snuggles him.]
Q: Michelle, you've talked about how you wouldn't settle until you had a love as powerful as your parents'. Did you end up with that kind of love ?
Michelle: Actually, that's something that we talked about the other day. I really feel I have a person who is going to work through anything with me and who is not going to leave. We've talked about how love changes and how it's going to evolve and how we're going to navigate through things.
We are both willing to do whatever it takes, and we're willing to make sure that we conduct ourselves in a way that trust is never broken.
So that's a roundabout answer, but yes. I absolutely do feel like we have a relationship like my parents', for sure.
Q: Nayte, what do you love most about Michelle?
Nayte: There's so much that I love about Michelle, it's hard to put it into a quick little couple of sentences. But from day one, she was able to see me for me. And that's huge. She was able to accept me and help me and hold my hand through the process of navigating expressing myself, navigating my love for her.
And here we are, ready to take on the world together.
Michelle: I don't think Minnesota is ready. [Laughs.] They have, like, 24 hours to gear up, and then we're there for real.
