{"id":2018071,"date":"2025-09-13T01:09:34","date_gmt":"2025-09-13T01:09:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2018071"},"modified":"2025-09-13T01:09:34","modified_gmt":"2025-09-13T01:09:34","slug":"i-watched-the-summer-i-turned-pretty-at-a-sports-bar-i-saw-firsthand-that-young-adult-romance-is-a-spectator-sport","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/i-watched-the-summer-i-turned-pretty-at-a-sports-bar-i-saw-firsthand-that-young-adult-romance-is-a-spectator-sport\/","title":{"rendered":"I watched ‘The Summer I Turned Pretty’ at a sports bar. I saw firsthand that young adult romance is a spectator sport."},"content":{"rendered":"

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MANHATTAN \u2014 The charming neighborhood sports bar is so packed that none of the people clutching their cocktails and phones can move. Nor would they want to. Their eyes are fixed on the TV screen. Conrad Fisher has just appeared. Everyone screams. He\u2019s not even doing anything; he\u2019s just there.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m at a watch party for The Summer I Turned Pretty <\/em>at Blue Haven in New York City, where they\u2019re playing the penultimate episode of the series on every screen. The young adult romance show airs weekly on Prime Video and is based on beloved books by Jenny Han. It follows Belly Conklin’s journey as a young woman who learns that she’s gotten hot, and how the two longtime family friends she grew up with, spending summers at the beach, Conrad and Jeremiah Fisher, have noticed she’s hot too.<\/p>\n

Now in its third and final season, the characters are staunchly late-college-age and making adult decisions about marriage and careers. The stakes are high. I realized that watching the romantic sparring between brothers evoked feelings in me that I\u2019d only ever experienced in the front rows of a game between my college\u2019s football team and its rival: Fourth down, ball on the 10-yard line, no time-outs left, just seconds left in the game. I wanted to scream, and I did, at a sports bar surrounded by a crowd of 95% women in their 20s and 30s.<\/p>\n

A spectator sport<\/h2>\n

This is the first television show that Blue Haven has ever hosted a watch party for, and they started with Season 3. The staff picked The Summer I Turned Pretty <\/em>because it was fun, emotional, girly and set in the summer. The bar\u2019s manager, Sarah, was down to try it immediately. They just never expected it to blow up like this.<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re used to the crowds for sports and all, but this is a different demographic,\u201d Maria, a 27-year-old server, tells me. \u201cThe majority of our staff are women, so we\u2019re such a girl group anyway.\u201d<\/p>\n

The first watch party only had three tables set up for viewers, who watched in the back room of the bar. Then Maeve, a 27-year-old manager, posted on social media about drink specials the bar created that were named after the characters. Their bespoke menu went viral<\/a>, and by the next episode, they had to expand viewings to the main room.<\/p>\n

People mostly come in small groups of two or three but file in so tightly that they mingle with one another. Tables get reserved weeks in advance, and the space fills up long before showtime. Maeve says one woman traveled from Brazil with her mom just to come to this watch party.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is our home, and we\u2019re essentially inviting people into our living room to watch the show and bond \u2026 it\u2019s like one big slumber party watching a TV show,\u201d Maria says before handing me the Conrad cocktail, which was a perfectly moody Manhattan with a cherry.<\/p>\n

Maddie, the bar\u2019s 26-year-old social media manager, screens the episodes on Wednesday mornings before their 7:15 p.m. screenings so she knows exactly when to whip out her phone to get the perfect reaction shot on social media. People tend to boo Jeremiah, the younger, frattier, more outgoing brother who dates Belly for several years before getting engaged in the third season.<\/p>\n

What team are you on?<\/h2>\n

I polled dozens of people in the room in search of someone on Team Jeremiah, but I couldn\u2019t find any. He cheated on Belly, though they were \u201con a break,\u201d which is an indefensible crime in the eyes of the masses. Maria said she commented in his favor in one of the bar\u2019s viral social media posts, and it accrued quite a few likes, but if there are any of his defenders in the room with us, they\u2019re silent.<\/p>\n

Maria and Maddie both admit that they\u2019ve been Team Jeremiah in the past, though they rebuke him now. He was the better choice in Season 2, they say, because he was emotionally available, consistent and good at loving Belly. But it was never a fair competition because Conrad, whom she dated in Season 2 and harbored a long-term crush on throughout their childhood, was always in the back of her mind.<\/p>\n

\u201cJeremiah was more fun, always smiling and extremely cute. Conrad is always sulking, which is understandable. I love brooding,\u201d Maddie says.<\/p>\n

While navigating through the bar, I misheard something that Chanila, who is 28, told her friend over nachos, and mistook it as pro-Jeremiah. She quickly corrected me, shouting \u201cNo!\u201d over and over again. \u201cI\u2019m Team Conrad! You’d better put in your article that she was adamant about not being Team Jeremiah.\u201d<\/p>\n

Her friend, 29-year-old Courtney, says Jeremiah only ever wanted to be with Belly to one-up his brother. They get into a playful screaming match.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou wouldn\u2019t be with someone for four f***ing years just to one-up your brother! Guys, that\u2019s f***ed up!\u201d Chanila says, addressing the other two women at their table as well.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut imagine your mom only loved your brother and not you! Psychologically, it might happen,\u201d Courtney retorts.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo. It isn\u2019t love. It isn\u2019t true!\u201d Chanila insists. \u201c[Conrad] has always loved her, even when he was a kid. [Jeremiah] only loved her when she [hit puberty and] didn\u2019t wear braces and glasses. That\u2019s the f***ing truth.\u201d<\/p>\n

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