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Tefi Pessoa says she felt protective of Love Island contestants and wanted to comfort them during emotional moments
Pessoa reflects on the intense environment of the villa and the personal growth contestants experience on the show
She shares advice for young viewers about embracing nuance and having meaningful, face-to-face conversations
Tefi Pessoa admits she had to stop herself from running onto the set of Love Island to help some of the contestants while filming the most recent season.
While catching up with PEOPLE at Lollapalooza at T-Mobile’s Club Magenta, the Love Island: Aftersun host says she wanted to “interfere with nature” while watching the drama unfold.
“I think every girl, and I can only speak as a girl because I’ve only ever been a girl, but every girl has to go through not being chosen,” the 36-year-old says. “Every girl has to go through what exactly does ‘chosen’ mean to me? Do I want this?”
Not only that, but she says they also have to learn “what intimacy means” and how to overcome “friendship hurdles.”
Ciara Miller, Tefi PessoaCredit: Ben Symons/Peacock via Getty
“It’s just such a pressure cooker in that villa because a week feels like a month,” she adds. “So, everything’s just really accelerated and really intense.”
Season 8 premiered in early June and concluded with its finale on July 12, crowning winners Trinity Tatum and Bryce Alakai. The other couples in the final four consisted of Aniya Harvey and Carl Schmidt, Melanie Moreno and Sincere Rhea and Kayda Bosse and Zach Georgiou.
Pessoa admits that she felt “very protective over” the contestants, especially the women, on the show.
“I can’t watch a girl cry. I can’t do it,” she shares. “Knowing that they were in the villa next door in distress, I wanted to run in there in camouflage, like a painted face. I’d be like, ‘Give me 10 minutes with her so I can talk to her.’ They’re like, ‘No.’ “
“It’s like when you watch TheWild Thornberrys, and Nigel’s like, ‘You can’t interfere with nature.’ I’m like, ‘I need to interfere with nature. I need to talk to Melanie. I need to talk to Aniya, or whoever.’ ”
She feels like her job is to “be professionally myself.”
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“I feel like it is my duty to camouflage, tuck and roll into that villa,” she jokes. “But, then again, it’s like when your little sister is going through something and you’re like, ‘I want to take this from you, but you have to go through this.’ So, all you can really do is be evidence that it does get better.”
Pessoa, who has been sharing content and building a following for over six years, hopes she can show others that “sometimes things aren’t amazing, but sometimes you reach new lows and sometimes you reach new highs.”
“I don’t know anybody that I’ve ever looked up to that is perfect, so I like to think about that too,” Pessoa shares. “I think Michelle [Obama] gets mad at Barack [Obama] sometimes and probably says things she regrets. That’s what helps me sleep at night.”
“So, being part of that as my first introduction to national television in that way, I’m the luckiest little duck in the world,” she adds.
Despite it all, Pessoa shares that being a part of the Love Island production “felt like a family.”
“I’ve been on sets before and I’ve been part of productions, but nothing that massive and nothing that felt like such a family before,” she tells PEOPLE. “The only way the machine of Love Island works is if everybody works together. With Love Island, it really is a love of each other and reality TV, and wanting to have fun.”
Read the original article on People