The president of ABC Entertainment, Channing Dungey sat down during the Television Critics Association press tour to talk diversity on The Bachelor. More accurately, she came to discuss the absence of diversity on the show. Every contestant to date, since the show first aired in March 2002, has been a white man.
And, there have been 20 seasons.
To her credit, Dungey said, “I would very much like to see some changes there, and I think one of the biggest changes that we need to do is we need to increase the pool of diverse candidates in the beginning.”
But, the following statement is what looks a little funny in the light.
“Part of what ends up happening as we go along is, there just aren’t as many candidates.”
Dungey says that not enough black men make it to the end of The Bachelorette. It’s become a tradition that the next Bachelor will often be the man last spurned on the show, while the happy couple rides off into the sunset. And vice versa.
However, if there were more than the customary three black men per season, it may even the odds a bit.
Just for context, here’s the cast of last season’s The Bachelorette.
And now, the season before that.
When someone suggests the idea of just casting a man of color anyway, deviating from ABC’s formula, Dungey has concerns. She says, “The show has been very much in a cycle where the first runner-up in one cycle becomes the person who leads the next cycle and it’s worked very well for us because the audience feels really engaged in helping to choose that candidate.”
Because we all know that’s what makes reality television good. Right?
When asked if she believed audience engagement was more important than casting a person of color she “wouldn’t say that it’s more important”. But she says that the audience, “is incredibly passionate and invested in the show and we’d like to try to find a way to do both.”
Just to keep it all the way real, we’ve heard this kind of talk before. Former ABC president, Paul Lee had a conversation just like this one before his exit. He even went so far as dropping hints in January that the next leading lady in The Bachelorette would be a woman of color.
I’m not saying he lied, but it didn’t happen.
So, no real resolutions made. ABC President Channing Dungey is a fan of UnREAL, though. The fictional Lifetime television series goes behind the scenes of a Bachelor-esque show with a black man cast as lead in season 2.
Maybe life will eventually imitate art.
