The Bachelor’s Chris Harrison: Gay or chubby contestants wouldn’t be good for business
Bachelor host Chris Harrison doesn’t want producers to change the tried and true formula of pairing hot guys and hot girls — despite calls for more diversity.
“Is our job to break barriers, or is it a business? That’s not for me to answer,” Chris told The New York Times on Friday.
Earlier this season, Bachelor Juan Pablo Galavis came under fire for telling The TV Page a hypothetical gay star wouldn’t set a “good example for kids.”
Speaking with The New York Times, Chris took a much more tactful approach.
“Look, if you’ve been making pizzas for 12 years and you’ve made millions of dollars and everybody loves your pizzas and someone comes and says, ‘Hey, you should make hamburgers.’ Why? I have a great business model, and I don’t know if hamburgers are going to sell,” Chris said of his hesitation to introduce a gay Bachelor or Bachelorette. He added he’s “100 percent for equality and gay marriage” on a “philosophical level.”
Although Chris didn’t mention it, Bachelor producers would have a difficult time introducing a LGBT star from a purely logistical standpoint: The Bachelor or Bachelorette is generally a finalist from the previous season. That means a contestant would likely have to come out as bisexual, get selected as the next star, welcome both men and women into the house, include a gay competitor in the final group and then have that person be enough of a fan-favorite to get selected as the next star.
Theoretically, it would be much easier to improve the show’s diversity with “a less hunky” star — but Chris said that’s even more far-fetched.
“No. You know why? Because that’s not attractive, and television is a very visual medium, and I know that sounds horrible to say,” he said about accepting a “chubby guy.” Chris added that, in the eyes of television, even he’s “old and unattractive.”
