Speaker 1: Bushkin, This is solvable. I'm Ronald Young Junior, So well
Speaker 1: you married. That's Nate Olakoya, a contestant of ABC's Bachelorette,
Speaker 1: proposing to Michelle Young on National TV. The Bachelorette spent
Speaker 1: off to ABC's The Bachelor is a competitive reality dating
Speaker 1: show where contestants vie for the love of the lead,
Speaker 1: aptly titled The Bachelor or The Bachelorette. With the start
Speaker 1: of twenty twenty two, The Bachelor premiered it's twenty sixth season.
Speaker 1: The franchise has been a popular mainstay for ABC, with
Speaker 1: average viewership reaching over ten million in some seasons. I
Speaker 1: love both The Bachelor and The Bachelorette. I've watched for
Speaker 1: many seasons and at times I'd love to hate both
Speaker 1: shows as well. Recently, I felt like the shows have
Speaker 1: fallen out of step with reality. I mean, you have
Speaker 1: almost entirely white player pools. There was a year where
Speaker 1: both leads and all of their players were all white.
Speaker 1: Twenty years later, we finally get a black bachelor. We
Speaker 1: still have never seen a black woman when the ring
Speaker 1: which is getting the final rows. There's still so much
Speaker 1: that needs to happen. The past few seasons of the
Speaker 1: show have tried to address its blind spots with regards
Speaker 1: to race. Out of a combined forty four seasons, there
Speaker 1: have been two black Bachelorettes and one black Bachelor so far.
Speaker 1: But beyond the lack of inclusivity, watching the show is
Speaker 1: difficult at times because it's premise feels dishonest. Everything you
Speaker 1: see on that screen is a choice made by producers,
Speaker 1: everything from what's actually happening on the screen, especially to
Speaker 1: what they're not showing you. That's Chad Coulchin and Lizzie Peace,
Speaker 1: who you heard earlier, are co hosts of Game of Roses,
Speaker 1: a podcast about the Bachelor and Bachelor Rette franchises. I
Speaker 1: enjoy listening because Chad and Lizzie talk about the show
Speaker 1: in a very different way, not as a reality show
Speaker 1: that chronicles to search for love, as the franchise purports
Speaker 1: itself to be, but rather as a game with a prize.
Speaker 1: And we meticulously recorded every play that has ever been
Speaker 1: made by any player in the history of the game,
Speaker 1: which gave us an in depth understanding of not only
Speaker 1: the evolution of the game, but all of these different
Speaker 1: statistical categories that allow us to apply metrics to strategy
Speaker 1: for players coming into the game who want to try
Speaker 1: to win the ring, the crown, get Top four, get
Speaker 1: their million Instagram followers, or whatever their goals may be. Today,
Speaker 1: we're talking to Lizzie and Chad not only about the
Speaker 1: problems on this one reality show, but about how we
Speaker 1: could take a more honest approach in producing and viewing
Speaker 1: reality television. The belief that reality TV is real is
Speaker 1: a solvable problem. Pretend that I've never watched this show
Speaker 1: in my life, and just give me the most basic
Speaker 1: description of The Bachelor you can. The Bachelor is a
Speaker 1: ten round game of attrition where around thirty women try
Speaker 1: to compete to date one man. And the way that
Speaker 1: we sort of break down the show on our podcast
Speaker 1: as well as the book that we have coming out,
Speaker 1: is treating it like a game, as the end goal
Speaker 1: being either to win the ring, to win the crown,
Speaker 1: or around top four placement, because then you are guaranteed
Speaker 1: a spot in Bachelor in Paradise, subsequent appearances on the show,
Speaker 1: and can possibly get a million Instagram followers. It's funny
Speaker 1: because I've known the show is not real, and most
Speaker 1: of my arguments against it have to be with what
Speaker 1: they're pressing forth as the ideal body type, the ideal race,
Speaker 1: the ideal way to fall in love, and the ideal
Speaker 1: family standard. Those are the practices that I argue with
Speaker 1: the most. But what I'm hearing from you is that
Speaker 1: it's there's more theater in this show than a regular
Speaker 1: watcher would would even realize. Is that absolutely, it's pro
Speaker 1: wrestling at this point, almost the kind of it is real.
Speaker 1: I mean, every once in a while there is a
Speaker 1: relationship that comes out of this show. There is potentially
Speaker 1: even a family that does happen. It is rare, but
Speaker 1: that's also part of the game. It's not real, yeah,
Speaker 1: but the viewing audience, I think largely still believes it is.
Speaker 1: So one segment of your podcast is there's a running
Speaker 1: theme of the number of days and Lizzie, you do
Speaker 1: you cover this portion the number of days without an
Speaker 1: Asian Bachelor? Why is that important to note? Well, it
Speaker 1: started out as the Days Without a Black Bachelor, the
Speaker 1: DWAB as we call it, and we were tracking this
Speaker 1: almost since the very beginning of our podcast until the
Speaker 1: casting of Matt James, and so the day that his
Speaker 1: premier aired, the DWAB finally went to zero, there was
Speaker 1: finally zero days without a black Bachelor. For us, especially
Speaker 1: having watched you know, the history of the whole series,
Speaker 1: we have basically seen how racist the casting practices are.
Speaker 1: I mean, you have almost entirely white player pools. There
Speaker 1: was a year where both leads and all of their
Speaker 1: players were all white. Years later we finally get a
Speaker 1: black bachelor. We still have never seen a black woman
Speaker 1: win the ring, which is getting the final rows. There's
Speaker 1: still so much that needs to happen. And during Matt
Speaker 1: James this season, even though they had the most diverse
Speaker 1: player pool of all time, they were getting a proportionately
Speaker 1: lower amount of screen time than the white players during
Speaker 1: that season. Now we have days without an Asian Bachelor
Speaker 1: because there hasn't been an Asian lead, There's been very
Speaker 1: low Asian representation in terms of the players as well.
Speaker 1: It's important for us to keep holding them accountable, to
Speaker 1: make sure that you know, it's not a show upholding
Speaker 1: white supremacy essentially. And I think it's important to note
Speaker 1: too that it's not just about who's getting cast or
Speaker 1: who the leads are. Those are all subjective choices, obviously,
Speaker 1: but so are the stories being told and who makes
Speaker 1: it into the final four. The leads don't actually choose
Speaker 1: who gets the first impression Rose, who gets to go
Speaker 1: on the dates, who gets the group date Roses. That's
Speaker 1: all done by producers. When we think about things like
Speaker 1: the reckonings that kind of begin to happen in society,
Speaker 1: and it seemed like, and especially into different types of industry,
Speaker 1: There's one in the cooking industry, there's one of course
Speaker 1: in Hollywood, and just everywhere. It just seemed like there
Speaker 1: are ripple effects of people waking up to the realities
Speaker 1: of racism. So when we talk about race and this
Speaker 1: show specifically, we talk about these being subjective choices. Do
Speaker 1: you think a show like The Bachelor can be reimagined
Speaker 1: to position itself as a reality show that is about
Speaker 1: love in the current era for us, we think that
Speaker 1: they need to embrace social media rather than run away
Speaker 1: from it, as they seem to be doing with the
Speaker 1: Bachelor Paradise storyline this year. I think they need to
Speaker 1: catch up to where society is. They've been very slow moving.
Speaker 1: You know, they've been making it up in terms of race,
Speaker 1: but they've only featured one openly LGBTQ plus player during
Speaker 1: a main game season. That was Jamie King on Nick
Speaker 1: Baile's Season twenty one versus. You know, it's like one
Speaker 1: in five young people identify as LGBTQ plus at this point,
Speaker 1: So it's like, if you want to make more money
Speaker 1: and keep going and not be seen as this relic,
Speaker 1: we think that the game has to move forward and
Speaker 1: start representing. You know what love stories in our country
Speaker 1: actually look like. They don't embrace a lot of marginalization,
Speaker 1: so they don't necessarily disability size. They'd certainly have a
Speaker 1: certain archetype that they got there. Do you think that
Speaker 1: any of those things are things they get addressed if
Speaker 1: it moves from network television to a streaming platform, do
Speaker 1: they have an incentive to even try to address those issues?
Speaker 1: Do you think they even see them as issues? Well,
Speaker 1: they are experimenting right now. They had a bisexual bachelorette
Speaker 1: in Bachelor Australia some of the offshoot shows. They are
Speaker 1: trying things out and seeing what the reactions are, and
Speaker 1: I think we'll probably definitely see a bisexual lead at
Speaker 1: some point. Do you think you'll ever see a plus
Speaker 1: size lead or plus size contestant. We've had a couple
Speaker 1: plus size contestants and they tried to pitch Bob Guinea,
Speaker 1: the Bachelor of season four, as a kind of non
Speaker 1: traditional looking bachelor. He was like a little bigger than
Speaker 1: as soon as he shows up as the bachelor. He
Speaker 1: was a tall white dude, but like he wasn't you know,
Speaker 1: like a jack bodybuilder type dude. And then as soon
Speaker 1: as he shows up in the first thing they show
Speaker 1: is him jogging and like getting in quotes in shape
Speaker 1: to be the Bachelor. So even that was kind of
Speaker 1: like overturned. And to answer your question, like do they
Speaker 1: see these as problems? I don't know, whatever kind of
Speaker 1: antiquated views they want to promote, whatever kind of psychological
Speaker 1: torture they want to impart upon any of these players.
Speaker 1: It's like, well, it's good TV. Well that what does
Speaker 1: that mean though we're destroying the fabric of America? Is
Speaker 1: that like for good TV? That's where we're at now?
Speaker 1: So talking more about that, do you think it's actually
Speaker 1: destroying the fabric of America? Because I'm I'm prone to hyperbole,
Speaker 1: and I say yes, but talk about how yeah, it
Speaker 1: absolutely is, because there's I mean, we just came out
Speaker 1: of the Trump era and this notion that we can
Speaker 1: just promote open lies through media, and there's going to
Speaker 1: be a certain segment of the population who either does
Speaker 1: outright believe it or behaves as though they do. We'll
Speaker 1: get us into situations like we're at now, where nobody
Speaker 1: trusts anything in the news, nobody trusts science, nobody trusts
Speaker 1: anything because everybody thinks everything is a lie. I think
Speaker 1: reality TV is I mean, it's not where it started,
Speaker 1: but it's like throwing gasoline on the fire. It's always
Speaker 1: about driving people into emotional breakdowns so that we can
Speaker 1: watch that as entertainment. And I know that a lot
Speaker 1: of people think Bachelor is just kind of like a frivolous,
Speaker 1: guilty pleasure, but to me, it really is the most
Speaker 1: accurate reflection of our current society, especially one in which
Speaker 1: we just had a reality TV show host as President
Speaker 1: of the United States. I like the ways in which
Speaker 1: that you guys are critical of the show by you know,
Speaker 1: bringing it into reality and talking about the elements of
Speaker 1: it that aren't real. I think that's important, and I
Speaker 1: think you guys definitely have encouraged a different way to
Speaker 1: watch The Bachelor, but you guys also have some ideas
Speaker 1: of how the show can be improved or a better
Speaker 1: version of a dating show. Do you guys want to
Speaker 1: talk me through what some of those are. We would
Speaker 1: like to see a more inclusive, more honest reality show
Speaker 1: basically that's more clear about what people are going on
Speaker 1: reality dating shows for, and just a more honest approach
Speaker 1: to reality television. I think for the past twenty years
Speaker 1: and all reality TV, there has been this line drawn
Speaker 1: between the producers and the audience, and the producers saying
Speaker 1: they can't see behind the curtain. The thing we're making
Speaker 1: is this lie and they're eating it up, and that's
Speaker 1: how we're making our money. But audiences are like so
Speaker 1: much more savvy now. We all basically are making reality
Speaker 1: TV shows in our instagrams and our TikTok's twenty four
Speaker 1: hours a day. We understand how things are produced now.
Speaker 1: I think all reality shows should step out of the
Speaker 1: shadows and be much more transparent about the production elements
Speaker 1: of it, and even maybe have that be a component
Speaker 1: of the show itself. Every once in a while, especially
Speaker 1: in Bachelor, you'll see a producer kind of like sneak
Speaker 1: out of the shadows to have a conversation with somebody
Speaker 1: or whatever. But I think you can have all that stuff,
Speaker 1: Like right up front, what do you think we lose
Speaker 1: by mining our own lives for content in this way?
Speaker 1: Mindfulness being in the present moment. I think we have
Speaker 1: different opinions on this. For me, I'm ready for the
Speaker 1: chip in my head. I want to live in the
Speaker 1: metaverse now. I think everything should be content at all times.
Speaker 1: We are moving very quickly towards a society in which
Speaker 1: everything has recorded twenty four hours a day, and the
Speaker 1: job will really be curation. It will be who can
Speaker 1: find the best, most interesting things if you look at like,
Speaker 1: do you know Tank Sinatra, that meme artist? Yes, I've
Speaker 1: afforded a lot of Tank Sinatra memes to my friends.
Speaker 1: I follow him on Instagram. He also does Influencers in
Speaker 1: the Wild that is literally just videos of people making
Speaker 1: content that we watch and laugh at. So now content
Speaker 1: is watching people making content, and eventually it's going to
Speaker 1: be people sleeping, people just like sitting on their couch.
Speaker 1: People will start getting famous for those things once we're
Speaker 1: recording everything all the time, and I'm down for it.
Speaker 1: There's a hotel in Japan that you can stay out
Speaker 1: for free, but they just record you the whole time.
Speaker 1: Is that good. What can listeners do if they want
Speaker 1: to see the quality of their reality television improved with
Speaker 1: shows like The Bachelor or anything else that they love watching.
Speaker 1: Have a higher level of scrutiny for everything you're watching.
Speaker 1: Always be asking yourself when you see anything on any screen,
Speaker 1: why am I seeing this? Who wants me to see this?
Speaker 1: And why do they want me to see it? Like
Speaker 1: they're presenting it. Everything you see on that screen is
Speaker 1: a choice made by producers, everything from what's actually happening
Speaker 1: on the screen, especially to what they're not showing you.
Speaker 1: There's so much media being generated, and now with deep fakes,
Speaker 1: anything you want can be generated. Anyone can say anything. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and especially I would say, no one is as evil
Speaker 1: or as good as they probably appear given the edit.
Speaker 1: They need these types of basic archetypes in every season.
Speaker 1: Villains Fools we have We have broken down into twelve
Speaker 1: archetypes in our book. But keep those in mind and
Speaker 1: do not send threats or any hate towards people that
Speaker 1: you don't know all the internet. How do you think
Speaker 1: that results in improving the reality television? Like? What do
Speaker 1: you think will come of that? I mean, ideally you
Speaker 1: don't see players suffer from mental illness the way that
Speaker 1: you were seeing a lot right now. And this has
Speaker 1: been going on since season one. Linnise Adams, the first
Speaker 1: black woman to appear on the show, who actually got
Speaker 1: the first kiss in season one, went through like horrible
Speaker 1: mental illness and started self medicating after she got a
Speaker 1: huge racist backlash against her appearance, like all of these
Speaker 1: white supremacists put videos of her on websites and stuff.
Speaker 1: It's hard to prepare for the mental toll that having
Speaker 1: yourself scrutinized, seeing yourself edited in all sorts of ways,
Speaker 1: saying things that you never said, affects the players. What
Speaker 1: do you guys see for the future of Game of Roses?
Speaker 1: What do you guys see for the future of The
Speaker 1: Bachelor in five to ten years, you guys still going
Speaker 1: to be doing this? Do you guys think you'll get
Speaker 1: tired of it? What will it look like? And do
Speaker 1: you think it will be improved? What do you expect
Speaker 1: that it looks like as you guys continue on, We're
Speaker 1: really hoping our book comes out, How to Win the Bachelor,
Speaker 1: and I think it will change the way people watch
Speaker 1: the show. That's one of our goals and it adds
Speaker 1: like a what we think is a fun element to
Speaker 1: treat it as a sport, and we think that more
Speaker 1: and more people will and we'll get you know, we
Speaker 1: did some statistical work on this, but we're hoping, you know,
Speaker 1: others pick up where we left off and do even
Speaker 1: more statistics and make it into, you know, something akin
Speaker 1: to the stats that baseball has, for instance, you know,
Speaker 1: where you're tracking everything. I don't know if we'll still
Speaker 1: be doing this in five years. We are trying to
Speaker 1: do our own version of a dating game that is like,
Speaker 1: at least in our opinion, a little more progressive, a
Speaker 1: little more inclusive. And so we'll see, you know, hopefully
Speaker 1: we can get that sold and on the air. Appreciate
Speaker 1: you guys both for participating. Thanks for having us. This
Speaker 1: was fun. Yeah, this has been a blast. This was
Speaker 1: so awesome. Lizzie Pacing Chad Coulching are the hosts of
Speaker 1: the podcast Game of Roses. We have linked to their
Speaker 1: new book, How to Win the Bachelor in our show notes. Also,
Speaker 1: if you're watching the twenty twenty two season of The Bachelor, ABC,
Speaker 1: I will say that listening to their podcast makes the
Speaker 1: show just better, So definitely seek that out wherever you listen.
Speaker 1: Solvable is produced by Jocelyn Frank, Research by David Job,
Speaker 1: Booking by Lisa Dunn, editing help from Kashall Williams. Our
Speaker 1: managing producer is Sasha Matthias, and our Executive producer is
Speaker 1: mil LaBelle. I'm Ronald Young Junior. Thanks for listening.