Chief stewardess Daisy Kelliher breaks down her surprising entanglements aboard Parsifal III for 'Below Deck Sailing Yacht' season 4.
"I definitely never thought I’d be the kind of woman that, you know, I'd be in a love triangle with two guys, let alone it happen this season, but there you go. That's the beauty of Below Deck," Daisy Kelliher quips to ET, just ahead of Below Deck Sailing Yacht's season 4 premiere.
Season 4 is Daisy's third season as chief stewardess, alongside First Officer Gary King and Chief Engineer Colin Macrae. Those two also happen to be the men she finds herself entangled with aboard Parsifal III.
"Usually it's me, another woman and a guy," she notes. "I am so happy that it gets to be me and two guys... I'm gonna go as far as, they're fighting over me."
This charter season is Colin's first as a single man; he's always had a girlfriend back home, keeping him out of the fray of cross-crew hookups... until now.
"I was a bit confused," Daisy admits of feeling a spark with Colin after years of friendship. "I do tend to date guys that are my friends, and that I have relationships with, because of that kind of slow-burning side of me, and that trusting-- I need to trust someone."
"There were parts of me that felt like we were very different, and I wasn't sure where he stood," she adds. "Every day would be like, is this something more? Oh, no... it is just a hook-up. No -- wait, maybe it's something more. So it was... it was a weird one for me. I wasn't sure what was going on."
The unexpected romance brings out a jealous side of Gary, which caught Daisy off guard.
"He had two seasons to try and pursue me, he chose not to," she points out, laughing at Gary's presumption that Daisy would go after Colin to make him jealous.
"If I'm dating you for three years and you cheat on me, yeah, I’m gonna to sleep with your best friend or your brother, probably," she cracks. "Like, I've done it in the past, I'm probably gonna do it again. But me and Gary were never anything, you know? I'm not quite sure what he thought that I was trying to gain from that. We were never in a relationship."
Gary and Daisy did have one steamy hot-tub make-out session in season 3, but never took things any further than that.
"I felt like there was a bit of an ego, you know? His ego was hurt," she surmises. "I think that was more of it than he actually wanted to be with me. But yeah, it was kind of surprising to hear. It was a weird when I was like, you had two years to tell me you liked me, and now you're choosing to tell me?"
Daisy believes Gary only wanted her once she was unavailable, which "definitely changes" the dynamic she, he and Colin have, both on and off the clock.
"It definitely causes some conflict, some tension," she teases, "and it was hard to navigate, to be honest, it was -- and the last thing I wanted to do is to break within friendships that, for me, it's not worth any sort of make-out session."
"You're definitely going to see some ups and downs for sure between the three of us," she adds, going on to share that she still considers both men friends.
"As regards to them being friends... to be honest, I don't know," Daisy confesses. "I'm staying well out of it. I'm kind of exhausted about hearing about it, so -- I've got a year of it, so I don't know if they're on speaking terms or at how good those speaking terms are."
What she won't divulge is if she considers either Gary or Colin more than a friend at this point. "I feel like you need to wait and see, because there is a lot to unpack," she offers, "and I don't want to spoil anything."
Judging by the trailer, Gary seems to be pursuing every woman onboard this season, behavior which has historically caused infighting within Daisy's department.
"My department this year -- shockingly! -- was not affected by Gary," she reveals. "I feel like his department possibly was more affected than mine."
Daisy has two new stews this season: Lucy Edmunds and Mads Herrera. She's a fan of both, but also calls them "very green."
"They were very inexperienced. I mean, incredibly inexperienced," she laments. "I'm not even sure Lucy knew what a Bloody Mary was, let alone how to make one. So, that was a big challenge but, for me, the most important thing is having a good attitude, having a smile and having each other's back and being a team, so I don't really care. I can teach you how to make a Bloody Mary."
Daisy says she was fine with getting her girls up to speed, but Captain Glenn Shephard was concerned the interior team "wasn't performing to the standards that he wanted or expected." The pressure he places on her pushes Daisy to an emotional state she's never experienced on camera.
"I cry several times throughout the season," she says. "I had, like, a full breakdown. You got to see the real, emotional raw stuff, which isn't very fun for me, but it was hard."
"I felt backed into a corner," she recalls. "It's hard for anyone to be be criticized, and I think most importantly, when my department was criticized, I felt like I was giving a 110 percent, so I felt frustrated that I couldn't do more."
"This season, I think it almost broke me," she adds. "I think all viewers will also learn a lot more about my personality this year. I feel like the first season was the challenge of just my job, getting to know the boat, the crew; the next season, it was more about the guests and me kind of letting loose a bit more. And then this season, I just go full, like, here I am. Let's ugly cry. Let's make out with loads of people. Let's talk about my family."
Daisy says her "guard is down" this season, which "for me, it's not that comfortable to show that side, and then to show to a million people is a whole other ball game."
It's not all personal drama for Daisy, though; there's also boat drama, as Parsifal III proves to be in a prickly state for most of the charter season.
"It was a really tough season," she says. "Parsifal just did not behave. She was like a toddler. She was going up and down, all around. She was all over the place."
"It just shocks me how we go into every season and we're still delivered this fresh, new, raw drama, all authentically," she continues. "It's like, wow. But I think the viewers are gonna feel the frustration that we felt."
Below Deck Sailing Yacht airs Mondays at 8 p.m. ET/PT on Bravo.
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