The Bachelorette (TV Program)

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    ‘The Bachelor’ Promises True Love. So Why Does It Rarely Work Out?

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    Of the 40 combined seasons of “The Bachelor” and “The Bachelorette,” only eight couples have stayed together. We spoke to former contestants and leads about roadblocks to a happy ending.The season premiere of any installment in “The Bachelor” franchise always starts the same: with the host talking directly to camera about the lead’s almost-certain path to finding lasting love. Unlike other popular reality dating shows, the franchise markets itself as a genuine chance to find love without any other incentives like cash prizes.But it’s actually not all that probable: Of the 40 combined seasons of “The Bachelor” and “The Bachelorette,” only eight couples have stayed together — not great betting odds.Morale in the franchise was low going into 2023, with no recently minted couples still together, until ABC announced a hopeful new twist. “The Golden Bachelor” pledged to aid then-72 year-old Gerry Turner make the most of a second chance at love following the death of his wife. At season’s end, he proposed to Theresa Nist in a teary finale. In January their wedding was televised on ABC. By April, they’d announced plans to divorce.That breakup felt like the last straw in believing this franchise could foster lasting love, so to look into why “The Bachelor” rarely makes good on its premise, we spoke to the former Bachelorettes Kaitlyn Bristowe and Tayshia Adams, as well as the former contestants Tyler Cameron and Melissa Rycroft about the flaws that doom the reality franchises’ lovebirds.“When you’re in that ‘Bachelor’ bubble, all you do is focus on and be brainwashed toward that person,” said Tyler Cameron, the runner-up on Hannah Brown’s “Bachelorette” season.Mark Bourdillon/ABC, via Getty ImagesThe main prize might not be the catch you thought.Many love-related reality television shows that are on the air today — think “Love Island,” “Are You the One?” or even “Bachelor in Paradise” — allow for participants to intermingle in environments specifically designed to mimic some version of real life.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Charity Lawson, a Former ‘Bachelorette’ Star, Attends NY Bridal Fashion Week

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      Charity Lawson earned a reputation of being a sweetheart after starring in the 20th season of “The Bachelorette,” which ended in August with her engagement to Dotun Olubeko, an integrative medicine specialist.Ms. Lawson, 28, seemingly always has a smile on her face. She knows what she likes and she does not put up with drama, a trait that was witnessed first hand this week amid the chaos that was New York Bridal Fashion Week — a chaos that this season was exacerbated by heavy rain and wind.The three-day event, from April 2 to 4, was an opportunity for bridal designers to show their latest collections to journalists, buyers and, in Ms. Lawson’s case, a bride-to-be who is starting to look for dresses for her 2025 wedding.She hopes to have a dress chosen by July for the wedding she is planning in California next fall, which will be followed by a traditional Nigerian celebration in Lagos, Nigeria, to honor her fiancé’s heritage.Before becoming a “Bachelorette,” Ms. Lawson, 28, was a contestant on the 27th season of “The Bachelor,” which premiered in January 2023. Later that year, she appeared on season 32 of “Dancing With the Stars,” finishing in fourth place with her dance partner Artem Chigvintsev.“It’s a lot,” Ms. Lawson, a former children’s therapist, said about appearing in back-to-back-to-back reality television shows broadcast last year. “I came into all of this quickly. I didn’t envision myself even being engaged.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      On ‘Golden Bachelor,’ Looking for Love and a Pickleball Partner

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      The latest “Bachelor” spinoff stars singles who are 60 and older, a largely ignored demographic in the ever-growing world of dating shows.Drivers in Los Angeles heading north on La Cienega Boulevard these days might notice a bronzed gentleman smiling down at them from billboards poised on either side of the street.He is Gerry Turner, an Indiana retiree who used to work in the food distribution industry. But as one of the billboards explains, those were not the qualifications that led to his becoming the star of the newest “Bachelor” spinoff.“He’s hot. He’s sexy. He’s 72.”The appraisal was taken from a recent headline about Turner, who as the first “Golden Bachelor” is the center of a new spin on the franchise that features singles 60 and older.“This is certainly the first time in a ‘Bachelor’ campaign that we used a quote from AARP in our billboards,” said Shannon Ryan, who oversees the show’s marketing.That “The Bachelor” is trying a slight variation on a tested formula is no revelation. The show’s myriad spinoffs have included “The Bachelorette,” “Bachelor in Paradise,” “The Bachelor” in Canada, “The Bachelor” in wintry weather, “The Bachelor” with a cash prize, and “The Bachelor” featuring people who work in the music industry.But in all of those variations on the theme, most of the eligible singles have been young, fresh-faced 20- or 30-somethings looking to marry for the first time. In “The Golden Bachelor,” which premieres on Thursday, the nearly two dozen women vying for Turner’s attention are between 60 and 75 and include divorcées, widows, mothers and grandmothers.Sitting in the show’s Mediterranean-style mansion in Agoura Hills, Calif., last month, a few hours before an evening of filming began, Bennett Graebner, one of the showrunners, recalled the new cast’s giddy introduction to the lavish home, with its infinity pool and Jacuzzis that look out onto the tree-dotted hills.At first, he said, the contestants’ reactions were similar to the ones he has seen over his 15 years as a producer for “The Bachelor.”“They ran around and looked at their bedrooms and yelled off the balcony, and we said, ‘OK, this feels like “The Bachelor,”’” Graebner said. “And they came down to the kitchen and had mimosas and they were doing toasts, and we said, ‘OK, this feels like “The Bachelor.”’”“And then,” he went on, “one woman said, ‘Let’s toast to Social Security!’”He hadn’t heard that one before.With “The Golden Bachelor,” ABC is recognizing that a core segment of its audience — the network’s median viewer age is 64 — has thus far been largely ignored in the ever-growing array of dating shows. (The median age drops to 42 for ABC shows streaming on Hulu.)In recent years, some programs have experimented with older participants, though not on this level and not with much success.In Netflix’s “Dating Around,” Leonard, a 70-year-old private investigator, became a fan favorite.NetflixIn “Dating Around,” Netflix’s first original dating series, which had its debut the year before “Love Is Blind” became a global phenomenon, the fan favorite was Leonard, a 70-year-old private investigator. On his dinner dates, he reminisced about doing LSD in his younger years and danced the Lindy Hop with one woman on the sidewalk.Last year, executive producers behind the popular dating show “Love Island” introduced a new show called “My Mom, Your Dad” on HBO Max, in which college-age adults watched their parents dating each other from a secret viewing room. The show didn’t last long, but an adaptation in Britain called “My Mum, Your Dad” just had its finale.And then there’s “MILF Manor” on TLC, in which eight mothers in their 40s, 50s and 60s found themselves at a Mexican hotel in a dating pool that consisted of their adult sons.Howard Lee, the president of TLC, said that “MILF Manor” intrigued the network because of its age bracket, which stuck out from the deluge of dating show pitches he gets featuring people in their 20s and 30s.“For the first time, this was a series that didn’t go in that direction,” he said. “MILF Manor” had a viral moment on social media — partly driven by its similarity to a “30 Rock” gag — but it is not yet clear whether it will get a second season.With “The Golden Bachelor,” in which the participants are as young as 60, the idea is getting its tryout in an altogether different league. After more than two decades, “The Bachelor” franchise remains a reality juggernaut, and “The Golden Bachelor” will be one of ABC’s biggest releases this fall, in part because of the network’s narrowed list of offerings during the Hollywood writers’ and actors’ strikes.If “The Golden Bachelor” succeeds, expect more opportunities to arise for senior singles to look for love on television.The showrunners said a broader cultural shift toward embracing, rather than hiding, aging helped pave the way for this show.“Martha Stewart is on the cover of Sports Illustrated at 80 or so years old,” said Jason Ehrlich, one of three “Golden Bachelor” showrunners. “John Stamos was posting photos of himself in the shower nude for his 60th birthday. There seems to be a moment where there’s an appetite for this.”“Bachelor” producers have been talking about a show like this for about a decade. Their efforts to make it a reality started in earnest in 2019, and they began circulating ads to recruit “seniors looking for love” in 2020. But Covid-19 put the idea on hold. (“This is not the show to make in the middle of a pandemic,” Graebner said.)In “My Mom, Your Dad,” college-age adults watched from a secret viewing room as their parents go on dates with one another.MaxWhen the producers returned to the concept earlier this year, they rediscovered Turner’s audition tape. In it he explains that he is ready to find another partner after losing his wife of 43 years, whom he met in high school, to a sudden infection.In an interview, Turner, a father and grandfather, said he is “very, very grateful, not just for myself but for people my age, that this show has been developed and it has come to reality.”The women of “The Golden Bachelor” brought into the mansion a certain self-assured humor that comes with age, the show’s producers said. For example, the cast debated for days whether it was Susan’s meatballs or Edith’s guacamole that gave the house gas. And in Thursday’s premiere episode, when one of the women steps out of the limousine and greets Turner she opens with one thing they both have in common: hearing aids.The women’s fun facts include that Christina’s first concert was the Beatles in 1964 and that Kathy is “OBSESSED” with Christmas. Several of the participants, including Turner, share an enthusiasm for pickleball. And some of the women also have long careers behind them; Marina, 60, has three master’s degrees.“When we cast for the other shows, some of the younger kids come to us and they have a feeling that they need to present a version of themselves that we want to see,” said Claire Freeland, the third “Golden Bachelor” showrunner. “These women were just themselves from the jump.”When dating shows have included older people in the past, it has often been as a kind of gimmick. The original “Dating Game,” which premiered in 1965, once brought on Kathryn Minner, an actress who was known for playing the “little old lady” characters on TV, movies and, most famously, in an ad campaign for Dodge vehicles.“The Bachelor” has always been fond of puns and stunts, and the golden edition is likely to have plenty of age-related bits. In the mansion, there is a supply of Werther’s Originals — just like in your grandmother’s living room — and the show’s promo introducing the female contestants includes footage of a woman cleaning her glasses and another slipping on pantyhose, to the tune of “Believe” by Cher.But the producers have tried to let the age-related humor be driven by the participants themselves.“We’re never laughing at them, but we are certainly laughing with them,” Ehrlich said. He said he studied the sitcom “The Golden Girls” to find interesting conversation topics to pull out if things get dull.The showrunners insist that this is not just a show for the older viewers of “The Bachelor,” about 43 percent of whom are 55 and older, according to a 2020 YouGov poll.They think “The Golden Bachelor” has the potential to bring generations together to watch a more-wholesome version of the franchise. They also hope that a different kind of cast can entice lapsed “Bachelor” fans back into the fold and bring in new audiences who might have turned their noses up at the brand before now.The ads, for example, won’t have the typical reality show snippets of screaming-and-crying dramatics, opting instead for more uplifting messaging, said Ryan, the president of marketing for Disney Entertainment Television, which includes ABC.Even Eileen Zurbriggen, a feminist social psychologist who has argued in her research that dating TV shows like “The Bachelor” are actively harming young viewers’ capacity to start healthy relationships, in part by strengthening the perception of dating as a kind of game, said she saw potential for the show to work against gender clichés.“It is refreshing, in a culture that is still so youth obsessed, to see older women presented as interested in sex and still sexually desirable,” Zurbriggen said.April Jayne, who appeared on the dating show “MILF Manor,” said a cultural shift around aging has allowed her to embrace being 61 in her career rather than hide it.TLCApril Jayne, an actress, singer and fitness trainer who was one of the contestants on “MILF Manor,” said she spent much of her acting career hiding her age. Now at 61, she is seeing more work opportunities than ever before since her reality TV appearance.“Once you hit middle age, it does not mean you’re washed up,” Jayne said, though she noted that the 40-year age gap between her and the young man she was dating on the show was perhaps a bit too large.By the way, she added, if ABC happens to be casting for a “Golden Bachelorette,” she is interested and available.Callie Holtermann contributed reporting. More

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      ABC Affiliate Cuts ‘Bachelorette’ Finale for Football Game

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      Fans of the reality show were not happy after a local ABC affiliate showed a preseason game between the Washington Commanders and Baltimore Ravens instead.Fans of “The Bachelorette” reality television show who live in the Washington, D.C., area were unable to watch the finale of the show’s 20th season on Monday night. It turns out their ABC affiliate showed an N.F.L. game instead — and a preseason one at that.If you know any “Bachelorette” fans, you can probably guess how the Washington-area ones felt about this particular programming call.“I was pretty frustrated,” Pegah Moradi, 25, who lives in Arlington, Va., said by phone early Tuesday.“It’s more important for sports to be live, obviously, than it is for a prerecorded reality show finale,” said Ms. Moradi, a graduate student. “But at the same time, it’s difficult when something that you’re accustomed to viewing at a certain time is just not there.”The practice of cutting one must-watch TV broadcast for another, more common in the past, has become rare in the streaming era. If something is important enough to broadcast live these days, networks and streaming platforms can usually find a way to do that.But on Monday, the “Bachelorette” finale was shelved in the D.C. area by ABC’s local affiliate in favor of a football game between the Washington Commanders and the Baltimore Ravens. (The Commanders won, 29-28, after kicking a field goal in the game’s waning seconds.)“It might be because the two football teams are regional favorites that people are obsessed with,” said Julia Swift, a professor in the Division of Communication and Creative Media at Champlain College in Burlington, Vt. “But people are also obsessed with ‘The Bachelorette.’”The “Bachelorette” finale was available on Charge!, a broadcasting network owned by the Sinclair Broadcast Group. Charge! is free and does not require a paid subscription. But some fans, including Ms. Moradi, had never heard of it and could not figure out how to watch.Professor Swift said that it would have made more sense to air the episode on a streaming platform that belongs to ABC or Disney, the network’s corporate parent.Representatives for Disney did not respond to a request for comment overnight. Neither did a spokesman for the N.F.L.The latest season of “The Bachelorette,” a spinoff of “The Bachelor” and “Bachelor in Paradise,” stars Charity Lawson, a real-life child-and-family therapist from Georgia who is looking for a life partner. Ms. Lawson, 27, began the season with 25 suitors; by the finale, she was down to three.The ABC affiliate that cut the finale likely did so after calculating that more people would watch the football game, said Amanda Lotz, a professor of media studies at Queensland University of Technology in Australia who has studied the U.S. television industry. Whatever the reason, the decision illustrates how the federal policies governing American television today were designed decades ago to promote “local sovereignty” by giving local affiliates discretion over what to air, said Professor Lotz, the author of “We Now Disrupt This Broadcast: How Cable Transformed Television and the Internet Revolutionized It All.”The concept of “local sovereignty” may sound anachronistic in the streaming era, she added, “but these were policies that were designed to protect local community differences so that they wouldn’t be overrun by the creation of a national culture.”One way to read Monday’s scheduling call would be as a kind of karmic victory for football fans, who were famously denied the ending of a nail biter of a game between the Jets and the Oakland Raiders on Nov. 17, 1968. With 50 seconds left, the television broadcast cut out abruptly to make way for “Heidi,” a made-for-TV children’s movie about a Swiss orphan.As for the “Bachelorette,” Ms. Moradi said she understood that the Commanders and the Ravens are both in her television market and have local fan bases. “But a preseason N.F.L. game versus the finale of a major franchise TV show is not a very difficult decision to make in terms of what to broadcast,” she said.After her viewing plans were scrambled on Monday, Ms. Moradi inadvertently saw a spoiler for the show as she searched for how to watch. At this point, she said, she wonders if watching the finale will even be worth her time.“Everyone I know who was watching it will have already seen it, for the most part, so I’ll just kind of be in the dark for 24 hours,” she said. “I won’t get to join in on this rare experience: watching live TV at the same time as everyone else.” More

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      How Married ‘Bachelor’ Couples Make it Work. Yes, Some Are Still Together.

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      As “The Bachelor” franchise enters its 20th year, still-married couples who met on that show and “The Bachelorette” discuss how they’ve built lasting relationships.In the latest season of “The Bachelor,” Clayton Echard, the show’s 26th lead, said after a late-night rendezvous with a hopeful suitress, “If I ever need validation to know that this process works, I’m seeing it unfold before me.”But according to the numbers, perhaps unsurprisingly, that “process” — a weeks-long mass courtship in front of cameras that is meant to end with a proposal and, presumably, a marriage — is not very effective at yielding long-term relationships.Since the “The Bachelor” debuted on ABC in March 2002 and “The Bachelorette” the following year, only six couples who met on those shows are currently married. A seventh is expected to wed in May. In this time, there have been 34 televised proposals in 44 seasons combined. Taking into account those who met on other spinoffs, the number of currently married couples jumps from six to 10. (Representatives from Warner Bros and ABC declined to comment for this article.)As the franchise enters its 20th year, what can be gleaned from some of those still-wed couples’ most dramatic story lines ever? Below, five of the six who met on “The Bachelor” and “The Bachelorette” discuss how they’ve made it work since meeting on set. (The sixth couple, Rachel Lindsay and Bryan Abasolo, declined to comment for this article.)Catherine and Sean LoweCatherine and Sean Lowe.Craig Sjodin/Disney General Entertainment Content, via Getty ImagesThe Lowes met on season 17 of “The Bachelor,” which aired in 2013 and ended with Mr. Lowe’s on-camera proposal in Thailand. They were married the following year.The couple, who live in Dallas with their two sons, ages 5 and 3, and daughter, 2, have since built a life around what Ms. Lowe called “super chill” family traditions, including making homemade pizza.“Our happy place is at home with our kids,” said Ms. Lowe, 35, who runs a local gifting service and, with her husband, started a namesake furniture line, Home by Sean & Catherine Lowe.Mr. Lowe, 38, said that when people ask him how he found love on “The Bachelor,” his response is always the same. “I liken it to meeting 25 strangers on a dating app — you might connect with one of them,” he said.But “then you have to enter the real world, and it takes work,” he added.That he and Ms. Lowe, or any couple who married after meeting on the show, have managed to stay together still strikes him as somewhat improbable. “When you have girls racing in bikinis while driving lawn mowers it’s silly,” he said. “All the elements go against creating a long-term relationship.”Ms. Lowe, however, said she left the show feeling wiser about how to form a successful partnership. The accelerated courtship the contestants experience made her realize the importance of focusing on “non-negotiables” at the start of any romance, instead of worrying about “things that don’t matter, like leaving the toilet seat up.”She added that meeting Mr. Lowe on set with other people around helped her get a better understanding of his character, recalling a moment when she saw him speaking to the crew and “noticed that he knew everybody’s name.”“I took that as such an insight into who he really was when the cameras were down,” Ms. Lowe said.Molly and Jason MesnickMolly and Jason Mesnick.Kevin Casey, via Getty ImagesMr. Mesnick, the lead on “The Bachelor” season 13, which aired in 2009, stunned fans when he called off his engagement to Melissa Rycroft six weeks after proposing on air, and later proposed (off air) to his future wife, who was that season’s runner-up.“I think the challenge is that the public looks at that as a real engagement,” Mr. Mesnick, 45, said of the series’ televised proposals, which he considers more of a commitment to “see what happens over the next several months or a year or whatever.”Before the Mesnicks wed in 2010, they went through a bit of a get-to-know-you-again period, said Ms. Mesnick, 38.“You need to start over at square one and get to know each other,” she said, echoing Mr. Lowe’s sentiments that cast members do not behave on set as they would in real life. “They’re literally getting to know a totally different person when there’s not a camera or producer in your face.”On the show, Ms. Mesnick said, “I was really calm,” but in real life, “I’m very Type A and kind of crazy.” Mr. Mesnick, on the other hand, is “super go-with-the-flow.”“I think it’s taken us 10-to-12 years to finally get into a really good, easy groove on how to function in life,” Ms. Mesnick added.The Mesnicks, who live in Seattle, now say their contrasting personalities not only provide equilibrium in their relationship, but also in their work as brokers co-leading a real estate team in Kirkland, Wash. “She does the marketing, and I do face-to-face with our clients,” said Mr. Mesnick.When they met, Mr. Mesnick was a divorced father of one. Moving in with him and his then 4-year-old son in 2009, Ms. Mesnick said, at first “rocked their world.” But she and her stepson, now 17, eventually became “thick as thieves.”The couple, who have a 9-year-old daughter, say open and honest communication has been essential to making their relationship last. Ms. Mesnick said it has also helped that they got together before picking apart relationships from “The Bachelor” became a sport of sorts on social media.“It would have been brutal,” she added of the backlash they might have received when she and Mr. Mesnick got back together after he broke off his engagement with Ms. Rycroft.Chris and Desiree SiegfriedChris and Desiree Siegfried.Francisco Roman/Walt Disney Television, via Getty ImagesAs two people who initially didn’t want to be on TV — Ms. Siegfried said she applied for “The Bachelorette” season nine, which aired in 2013, as a “skeptic joke,” and Mr. Siegfried said that friends convinced him to join the cast after he declined an initial offer to participate — neither envisioned the experience would have a fairy-tale ending.But Ms. Siegfried, 35, a fashion designer and the founder of Desiree Hartsock Bridal, said that “really natural” chemistry paved the way for them to fall in love on set.Mr. Siegfried, 36, a loan officer, said “she was definitely someone I would pursue outside of television.”“Our conversation was easy,” he added. “And when we were talking, she knew what she wanted and was looking for in someone, and that was important to me.”After filming their on-camera engagement, Ms. Siegfried, who was living in Los Angeles and said she was “broke as could be,” relocated to Seattle, where she and Mr. Siegfried, who had moved there in 2011, started living in a new home together.“It would be hard for one person to dive into someone else’s life across state lines,” she said. “It was nice to start afresh together.”They married in 2015 and now live in Portland, Ore., with two sons, 3 and 5. Though the couple has no plans to appear on television again, watching it remains a beloved pastime, said Ms. Siegfried. Recently, their favorite shows include “Yellowstone” and “1883,” she said.Their relationship also benefits from spur-of-the-moment workday dates. “He’s like, ‘Hey, I have a break. You want to grab lunch?’” Ms. Siegfried said. “It’s fun to have that spontaneous lunchtime.”Heartfelt compliments, or “words of affirmation” as Mr. Siegfried put it, go a long way, too. “While everyone loves flowers, that’s not necessarily what she’s looking for.”Lauren and Arie LuyendykLauren and Arie Luyendyk.Paul Hebert/Disney General Entertainment Content, via Getty ImagesMr. Luyendyk, 40, a real-estate agent and racecar driver, initially proposed to Becca Kufrin at the end of “The Bachelor” season 22, which aired in 2018.But he soon ended their engagement because he couldn’t stop thinking about Ms. Luyendyk, 30, a fashion designer and the founder of the line Shades of Rose. On a live episode filmed after the pre-taped finale aired, Mr. Luyendyk proposed to Ms. Luyendyk in front of a studio audience.“I want to do this in front of everyone, because I want to show you that I should have done this a long time ago,” he said at the time.In some ways, the Luyendyks credit their bond’s strength to the backlash they faced after their engagement. “There was a lot of animosity in the room,” Ms. Luyendyk said. “I could see people glaring at me when I walked out.”“We’ve always said, ‘It’s us against the world,’” she added.The couple, who live in Scottsdale, Ariz., married in Hawaii in 2019, while Ms. Luyendyk was pregnant with their daughter, now 2. In June 2021, they became a family of five when the couple had twins, a boy and a girl.Between work and parenthood, they say it has been harder to carve out time for themselves, making their home an ideal venue when they can fit it in. One recent activity: “Goat yoga in the backyard,” Mr. Luyendyk said. “It was messy.”Their morning coffee ritual is another opportunity to connect. “We love to be up early and have coffee together and make that little time for us before the babies wake up,” he said. Added Ms. Luyendyk, “Some nights, I can’t wait to have coffee in the morning.”Trista and Ryan SutterTrista and Ryan Sutter.Craig Sjodin/Disney General Entertainment Content, via Getty ImagesThe Sutters wed in December 2003 on a three-part televised special that followed their appearance on “The Bachelorette” season one, which aired earlier that year. They now live with their son, 14, and daughter, 13, in Vail, Colo., and their 18-year marriage is the longest in the franchise’s history.Ms. Sutter, 49, who has since written a book and hosted a podcast, was the runner-up on season one of “The Bachelor.” She said that appearing on both shows convinced her you can find love anywhere, including “on national television like we did.”Mr. Sutter, 47, a firefighter, said that though “there is pressure” for finalists like himself to propose at the end of a season, “I never felt it to the degree that I made any major decisions because of it.”But, he added, “If I’m being honest, I really didn’t know her as well as I probably should have prior to asking her to marry me.”Like other couples, acclimating to a regular life together after the show proved trying for the Sutters. Mr. Sutter said that a mental health professional whom he spoke to during the casting process told him that contestants’ lives could be affected for up to three months after their season ended. “She missed the mark by years,” he said.Making time for in-person conversations is something both have prioritized over the course of their marriage. “Throw your phones in your drawer once you come home from work,” said Ms. Sutter of a tactic they use to eliminate distractions during one-on-one time.Playing pickleball, taking camping trips with their children and sitting down at a table to eat dinner each day are other activities that enhance their relationship.While no relationship is always roses and Neil Lane diamond rings, the Sutters say theirs is one that people continue to cite as an example of marital bliss. Over the years, Mr. Sutter said that they have been asked how they make their relationship work “hundreds of times,” and that their reply has evolved along with their marriage.If they could sum up their answer in a song, Ms. Sutter would point people to “Legends,” Kelsea Ballerini’s 2017 single. “Basically it says no one believed in us, but we did.” More

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      Chris Harrison Replaced as ‘Bachelorette’ Host by 2 Female Ex-Contestants

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }What to WatchBest Movies on NetflixBest of Disney PlusBest of Amazon PrimeBest Netflix DocumentariesNew on NetflixAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyChris Harrison Replaced as ‘Bachelorette’ Host by 2 Former ContestantsMr. Harrison, who acknowledged making comments dismissive of racism, will be replaced on the coming season by the first women to host the franchise, Tayshia Adams and Kaitlyn Bristowe.Tayshia Adams, above, will co-host the next season of “The Bachelorette” with Kaitlyn Bristowe. Both are former contestants of the show.Credit…Valerie Macon/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesMaria Cramer and March 13, 2021Updated 5:54 p.m. ETChris Harrison will not host the next season of “The Bachelorette” for the first time in the history of the franchise, which began as a guilty pleasure when it debuted in 2002 but has in recent years been criticized for its lack of diversity and insensitive handling of race.Mr. Harrison, 49, will be replaced by Tayshia Adams, who will become the first woman of color to host a season of the show, and Kaitlyn Bristowe. Both are former “Bachelorette” leads.In a statement, Warner Horizon and ABC Entertainment said they supported Mr. Harrison “in the work that he is committed to doing,” and pledged to continue to try achieve “greater equity and inclusion” within the franchise.“We are dedicated to improving the BIPOC representation of our crew, including among the executive producer ranks,” Warner Horizon and ABC Entertainment said, using an acronym meaning Black, Indigenous and people of color. “These are important steps in effecting fundamental change so that our franchise is a celebration of love that is reflective of our world.”Mr. Harrison announced last month that he was “stepping aside” from the current season of “The Bachelor” after acknowledging making remarks that dismissed the racist behavior of a contestant.The decision to feature two women as hosts also follows years of criticism of the show for its portrayal of women as being fixated on marriage or as petty and unstable. The show was also pressured for years by many of its fans, members of “Bachelor Nation,” to include nonwhite leads and more nonwhite contestants.Last month, ABC said that Emmanuel Acho, a former N.F.L. player and the author of the book “Uncomfortable Conversations With a Black Man,” would host an hourlong post-finale special of “The Bachelor” on March 15.The announcement that Mr. Harrison would not host “The Bachelorette” was the latest development in a tumultuous season, which had intended to break ground by featuring the first Black male lead, Matt James, in “Bachelor” history.Before Mr. James, there had been two Black leads on “The Bachelorette”: Rachel L. Lindsay, who was announced as the lead in 2017, and Ms. Adams, whose father is African-American and whose mother is Mexican, and who was a recent midseason replacement.Mr. James’s season was praised for its diverse cast, but many viewers became dismayed by the producers’ decision to focus on fights between the women instead of the relationships building between the contestants and Mr. James.That disillusionment grew into outrage as offensive social media posts and photos of one of the contestants, Rachael Kirkconnell, emerged.In one post, Ms. Kirkconnell had liked a photo with a Confederate flag. Another photo on social media showed her attending an “Old South” plantation-themed ball in 2018.Last month, Mr. Harrison defended Ms. Kirkconnell, who is one of the two finalists on the show, when Ms. Lindsay asked him about the ball during an interview on “Extra.” Mr. Harrison said that “50 million people did that in 2018.”“Rachel, is it a good look in 2018 or is it not a good look in 2021?” Mr. Harrison asked during the interview, suggesting that such parties might have been acceptable in 2018.Ms. Lindsay replied: “It’s not a good look, ever, because she’s celebrating the Old South. If I went to that party, what would I represent at that party?”Mr. Harrison, who frequently talked over Ms. Lindsay during the interview, accused the “woke police” of going after Ms. Kirkconnell and acting as “judge, jury, executioner.”“I don’t know how you’re equipped, when you’ve never done this before, to be woke enough, to be eloquent enough, to be ready to handle this,” he said.Kaitlyn Bristowe will co-host the next season of “The Bachelorette.”Credit…Jc Olivera/Getty ImagesMs. Kirkconnell has apologized. Mr. Harrison also apologized on Instagram after the interview and said that, by excusing historical racism, he had defended it.“I invoked the term ‘woke police,’ which is unacceptable,” Mr. Harrison wrote on Instagram. “I am ashamed over how uninformed I was. I was so wrong. To the Black community, to the BIPOC community: I am so sorry. My words were harmful.”AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      Chris Harrison to Step Away From ‘The Bachelor’ After ‘Harmful’ Comments

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }What to WatchBest Movies on NetflixBest of Disney PlusBest of Amazon PrimeBest Netflix DocumentariesNew on NetflixAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyChris Harrison to Step Away From ‘The Bachelor’ After ‘Harmful’ CommentsThe reality television show’s longtime host will be absent for an unspecified amount of time. He has come under fire after making remarks he now acknowledges were dismissive of racism.“I invoked the term ‘woke police,’ which is unacceptable,” Chris Harrison, the host of “The Bachelor,” said on Instagram. “I am ashamed over how uninformed I was. I was so wrong.”Credit…Richard Shotwell/Invision, via Associated PressFeb. 13, 2021, 7:36 p.m. ETChris Harrison, the longtime host of “The Bachelor,” announced on Saturday that he would be “stepping aside for a period of time” from the flagship reality television show, which he helped develop into a national obsession, after coming under fire for making comments that he acknowledged were dismissive of racism.In an Instagram post, Mr. Harrison said he had made the decision after consulting with ABC and Warner Bros. and would also not participate in the “After the Final Rose Special.”Media representatives for ABC, which broadcasts the show, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. It was not clear what exactly Mr. Harrison’s “stepping aside” would entail.The move by Mr. Harrison and the controversy surrounding his remarks are likely to send shock waves through “Bachelor” Nation and dampen a trailblazing season that features the first Black bachelor, Matt James.Before Mr. James, there had been only one other Black lead, Rachel L. Lindsay. In an interview on “Extra” with Ms. Lindsay this week, Mr. Harrison had sought to defend a current “Bachelor” contestant. That contestant has since apologized for what she said were racist “actions.”“I invoked the term ‘woke police,’ which is unacceptable,” Mr. Harrison wrote on Instagram, adding, using an abbreviation for Black and Indigenous people and people of color: “I am ashamed over how uninformed I was. I was so wrong. To the Black community, to the BIPOC community: I am so sorry. My words were harmful.”“This historic season of ‘The Bachelor’ should not be marred or overshadowed by my mistakes or diminished by my actions,” he continued, before announcing that he would step aside.The tangled situation that resulted in Mr. Harrison’s statement Saturday was ignited by his interview with Ms. Lindsay and involves Rachael Kirkconnell, a current contestant on the show whom many believe to be a front-runner.In recent weeks, Ms. Kirkconnell has faced scrutiny on social media platforms from users who have produced photos and other materials that purport to show her liking and participating in cultural appropriation and attending an “Old South” plantation-themed ball. Ms. Lindsay asked Mr. Harrison about the controversy surrounding Ms. Kirkconnell, and Mr. Harrison issued a staunch defense.He called for “grace” and assailed Ms. Kirkconnell’s critics as being “judge, jury, executioner.”“People are just tearing this girl’s life apart,” he said. “It’s just unbelievably alarming to watch this.”At one point in the interview, Mr. Harrison appeared to downplay the significance of a photo that purported to show Ms. Kirkconnell at the “Old South” antebellum-themed party, drawing pushback from Ms. Lindsay, who at 31 was cast as the first Black star of “The Bachelorette” in a season that aired in 2017.On Thursday, Mr. Harrison offered an initial apology on Instagram, saying he had caused harm “by wrongly speaking in a manner that perpetuates racism.”Then, on Friday in a podcast she co-hosts, Ms. Lindsay spoke out about the interview with Mr. Harrison. She said Mr. Harrison had apologized to her but said she was “having a really, really hard time” accepting his apology.“I can’t take it anymore,” she said, speaking broadly about her frustration with the franchise’s handling of race. “I’m contractually bound in some ways, but when it’s up — I am so — I can’t, I can’t do it anymore.”Ms. Kirkconnell also posted an apology on Instagram. While she did not directly confirm the veracity of the photos and other content posted online, she said her actions had been racist.“I’m here to say I was wrong,” she wrote in her post. “I was ignorant, but my ignorance was racist.”Mr. Harrison then offered his fuller apology on Saturday in the post in which he announced he was stepping away from the show for an unspecified amount of time.As the franchise has become somewhat more diverse, “The Bachelor” has also wrestled more awkwardly with race.In 2017, when Ms. Lindsay’s season as the first Black bachelorette aired, one contestant’s racist tweets were excavated; another called her a “girl from the hood.” She is from Dallas, where her father is a federal judge.In 2019, when contestants traveled to Singapore, they were unable to make sense of that city’s internationally famous food markets.In 2020, a contestant lost the prize of a cover of Cosmopolitan magazine when it was discovered she had modeled White Lives Matter merchandise.The franchise creates and recirculates a pantheon’s worth of former contestants, building dozens of brands each year that may become useful to the franchise or may be discarded.Sometimes past contestants re-enter the cluster of “Bachelor” shows (which include “Bachelor in Paradise,” a hookup-oriented bacchanal that brings together fan favorites and villains), but these careers often go on to exist just on social media, where people do sponsored content for toilet paper and start gyms.But in this case, in a rare show of solidarity, past contestants came together to speak up. For instance, the men of Season 16 of “The Bachelorette” came together to make a statement.Vocal online fans have included those in Reddit’s thebachelor channel, where hard-core followers of the show have blasted Mr. Harrison — and at least one popular post this week suggested boycotting the show entirely as viewers.Evan Nicole Brown and Choire Sicha contributed reporting.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More