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Bachelor Winter Games The Bachelorette 13

How Trump affected Bachelor Winter Games; what Bachelorette ratings revealed

The Bachelor Winter Games, Chris Harrison
Chris Harrison at The Bachelor Winter Games opening parade. The show features Bachelor cast from around the world. (Photo by Lorenzo Bevilaqua/ABC)

by Andy Dehnart 26 Jan. 2018 | 1:21 pm

Bachelor franchise creator Mike Fleiss says that President Donald Trump affected his ability to assemble a cast for Bachelor Winter Games, which draws its cast from Bachelor shows around the world. There are fewer international cast members because of Trump, Fleiss said.

Contestants from 12 countries, including the United States, will be on the show. In a story about this new extension of the franchise, The New York Times reports:

“Mr. Fleiss would have liked that number to be higher. But securing overseas talent proved difficult. News out of Washington strained the producers’ visa negotiations with other countries. ‘Our president didn’t make things any easier,’ Mr. Fleiss said.”

Fleiss also said that he’s unsure how Bachelor Nation fans will respond to this four-episode spin-off: “I really don’t know. The scenes that feature two international cast members talking to each other are tricky. I don’t know how we get around that, but I can feel that it won’t play as well on American television,” he told the paper.

He’s concerned in part because of how Bachelor Nation responded to Rachel Lindsay, the first black Bachelorette, and first black lead of a Bachelor season: fewer people watched.

Fleiss said, “I found it incredibly disturbing in a Trumpish kind of way. How else are you going to explain the fact that she’s down in the ratings, when—black or white—she was an unbelievable bachelorette? It revealed something about our fans.”

Yes, that’s the creator and executive producer of a major network reality show admitting/realizing/saying that some of his show’s fans are racist.

Despite that response and those ratings, and although Fleiss and ABC turned around and cast a white guy, Arie Luyendyk Jr., for the next Bachelor, Fleiss said he wants to cast another non-white lead: “I’m raring to try it again. I think it’s important.”

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about Andy Dehnart

Andy Dehnart’s writing and criticism about television, culture, and media has appeared on NPR and in Vulture, Pacific Standard, The Los Angeles Times, and other publications. He has covered reality television for more than 18 years, and created reality blurred in 2000.

A member of the Television Critics Association who serves on its board of directors, Andy, 41, also directs the journalism program at Stetson University in Florida, where he teaches creative nonfiction and journalism. He has an M.F.A. in nonfiction writing and literature from Bennington College. Learn more about reality blurred and Andy.

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reality blurred is your guide to the world of reality TV and unscripted entertainment, with reality show reviews, news, and analysis. It was created in 2000 by Andy Dehnart. He's still writing and publishing it today.

reality blurred is regularly updated with highlights from the world of reality TV: news and analysis; behind-the-scenes reports; interviews with reality TV show cast members and producers; and recaps and reviews of these reality TV shows, including Survivor, Big Brother, The Great British Baking Show, Shark Tank, The Amazing Race, The Bachelor, Project Runway, Dancing with the Stars, Top Chef, and many more.

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