Kat Johnston is one of the most unproblematic stews Below Deck Mediterranean has ever seen. But that doesn’t mean her Season 11 is drama-free. Instead, her storylines are split between a secret relationship and being a trusted confidant for her slightly jealous fellow stew. So far, however, Kat has taken everything in stride.
Take the Cooper Dawson situation. Once the chatter got loud enough to rattle him, Kat talked him off the ledge and agreed to end things publicly, only to continue dating in secret. Naturally, that plan is starting to fall apart in the most predictable way possible.
Now, Cooper looks single, so Gen Lillie is pulling up to his station, right in front of Kat. Reality Tea caught up with Kat to ask how she felt about that. Her answer tracks to how we thought it might: Gen’s flirting was “kind of pathetic,” but Cooper was also to blame. Moving forward, Kat never wants to be “someone’s pretty little secret again.”
Kat Johnston finally knows where she stands with Cooper Dawson
On a recent episode of Watch What Happens Live, Kat admitted, “I’m honestly still confused about where [Cooper and I] stand today.” Cooper then filled in her blanks online, saying they were friends. And he thought they were on the same page about that.
But “it seems as though things changed recently” for Kat, Cooper added. Perhaps watching this season “brought up old tension?” he guessed. So, was Kat confused? Or, did Cooper not spell things out as clearly as he thought?
“For me, he just never gave me any sense of clarity. Even after filming, I felt like he reached out to me, but it was never really sincere. I clocked that. And I feel like what I said on Watch What Happens Live for me was closure,” Kat explained.
Kat realized she was “done with this. And that probably made him mad, because I feel like he expected me to go on and be like, ‘He’s great, I love the way he treated me for a whole year …I love him.’ Unfortunately, I was never going to give him that satisfaction. And I don’t regret anything I said.”
Now, “We don’t talk at all.” Even still, Kat doesn’t “have any regrets.” But she does realize she was “maybe gaslit a bit. I should never be kept a secret; that shows you how he viewed me. I don’t want to be someone’s pretty little secret again.”
Will Kat call Gen Lillie out during Below Deck Med Season 11?
Recently on Below Deck Med, Gen started flirting with Cooper. Gen has also been in Kat’s ear, saying negative things about Kayley Smith. In her confessionals, Kat hates this, but on screen, she hasn’t really put her foot down. Will there come a time when Kat finally snaps at Gen?
“You’ll have to wait and see,” Kat teased. But where Gen and Kayley are concerned, “The tensions do rise. As each week passes, tension builds. And eventually, everything comes out.”
Obviously, the other elephant on the yacht is the whole Gen-likes-Cooper storyline. But this week, Cooper said Gen scared him. Does knowing this help Kat’s feelings about this one-sided plot? Somewhat, Kat admitted, but “It’s kind of pathetic to see too, because I would walk in, and she’d be blatantly flirting with him.”
“I should have probably said something” to Gen, she added. “But personally, I think Cooper should have stopped it.” Hear, hear, Kat. Thankfully, Kat and Gen remain on good terms post-filming.
Kat picks Joe Bradley as the best Below Deck Med bosun
On that same episode of WWHL, Kat picked Joe Bradley as the better bosun. Why? “Joe has great leadership skills,” and “I think he’s a really great guy, personally, probably because I haven’t gone out with him,” Kat joked. “Maybe that’s why my experience is good.”
“But in terms of leadership and running a team, Joe was always such a hustler.” So, every title bump he got this season was “very deserving.” If Kat had to choose between Max Salvador and Joe, Joe wins again, because “Max is great, but he’s a little off the rocker. I think it would be hard for Max to reel a team in and really delegate,” Kat said.
Also, Kat revealed, even more trouble is on the way for the deck team. “It gets crazier, on top of everything that’s already happening. I know that’s kind of a cliché thing to say, but genuinely living it, I was like, like, ‘what is happening?’ It never gets stagnant. That’s all I gotta say.”
Below Deck Mediterranean continues Mondays at 8/7c on Bravo, and streams on Peacock.
