After an impromptu greeting from Mr. Fitzwilliam Waffles, Sarah and Elyse chat with Leah and Bea from The Ripped Bodice about the most recent season of The Bachelor. They’re all fans of the series, and have a lot of perspective on it, on the multiple storylines presented in each season, and on what is going on beneath the surface, behind the scenes, and between all the people who tune in every week. If you’ve never watched it, don’t worry – things are explained, especially to Sarah, who can’t watch cringe-tv so reality programming is right out. They talk about the most recent season, the way the show frames sex, relationships, wealth, and the entire concept of reality, and what The Bachelor and romance fiction have in common. Plus, Elyse gives a quick squee about the new Beauty and the Beast movie.
NB: There’s a bit of uneven audio volume that I tried to fix – my apologies. There’s also some scuffing noises on the microphone, but that was a cat, and I know that cat is not sorry.
❤ Read the transcript ❤
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- You can find The Ripped Bodice at their website, and you can find Fitzwilliam Waffles on Instagram.
- The Santa Fe Animal Shelter’s Dog Bachelor program on YouTube
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This Episode's Music
This is from Caravan Palace, and the track is called “Je m’amuse.”
You can find their two album set with Caravan Palace and Panic on Amazon and iTunes. And you can learn more about Caravan Palace on Facebook, and on their website.
Podcast Sponsor
The podcast this week is brought to you by author Tracy Ewens, whose new book Exposure comes out March 28, 2017. Tracy knows you like romance, so she’d like you to know her latest contemporary romance has the following excellent pieces of catnip:
- A wildlife photographer heroine – Meg – who has recently moved back to San Francisco. She wants a life with more stability, where she can see her family more than once a year, and indulge in owning a toaster and using a full-sized tube of toothpaste.
- A famous hero with secrets! Westin is a famous actor known best for blockbuster movies in which he drives a menagerie of exceedingly fast cars. But West would kind of like his fifteen minutes of fame to be over: he misses his privacy, and in real life, he’s a terrible driver.
- A fake relationship! A media frenzy erupts after a very simple kiss on the cheek, and when they’re thrown together in public, Meg discovers the real person behind the photographs. West begins to wonder how he can live his real life without her in it.
Nothing is simple when it seems like the world is watching. You can pre-order/find Exposure wherever ebooks are sold. And thanks to Tracy Ewens for sponsoring this episode!
Transcript
❤ Click to view the transcript ❤
[music]
Sarah Wendell: I saved the last rose, and it’s for you. Welcome to episode number 239 of Smart Podcast, Trashy Books. I’m Sarah Wendell from Smart Bitches, Trashy Books. With me today are Elyse and also Bea and Leah from The Ripped Bodice. As promised, they are going to talk all about this past season of The Bachelor. And they talk about the multiple storylines that are presented in each season with what’s going on beneath the surface and behind the scenes and between all the people who tune in every week. Now if you’re listening and you’re thinking, I do not watch The Bachelor; this is not going to be very interesting, I am not a reality television show watcher either, and I thought this was really fascinating.
Now I have two notes: one, there is a bit of uneven volume in the audio that I tried to fix, and I did my best. There’re also a few scuffing noises on, on the microphones, and that was a cat, and I know that cat is not sorry, so I’m not going to apologize on behalf of the cat.
Now I do have compliments, which is the most fun. So:
For Ariadne – I hope I said that right; maybe it’s Ariadne: Two people independent of one another just wrote poems in two different languages, both wishing that they could meet someone like you.
To Linda D.: There are at least six individuals walking around doing their thing, all of whom are smiling today because of you.
And to Jaime: Entrance to the underground fairy dance pavilion is restricted on your birthday due to an overabundance of celebration, and I thought you should know that.
And if you are wondering, what is this crazy business? Have a look at patreon.com/SmartBitches. For small or medium-size or large pledges, you can help support the show and help commission transcripts for episodes that don’t have them, but at some pledge levels there are individual handcrafted, artisan, locally sourced compliments that are all heartfelt and handcrafted by me, so if you have had a look or if you are a podcast patron, thank you so much for that!
I have a podcast sponsor to tell you about. The podcast today is being sponsored by author Tracy Ewens, whose new book Exposure comes out on March 28, 2017. Tracy knows you like romance, and so she would like you to know that her latest contemporary romance has the following excellent flavors of catnip – are you ready? First: a wildlife photographer heroine, Meg, who has recently moved back to San Francisco. She wants a life with more stability where she can see her family more than once a year and indulge in things like owning a toaster and using a full-size tube of toothpaste. Number two: a famous hero with secrets. Westin is an actor known best for blockbuster movies in which he drives a menagerie of exceedingly fast cars, but West would kind of like his fifteen minutes of fame to be over. He misses his privacy, and in real like he’s a terrible driver. And number three: heads up, a fake relationship! A media frenzy erupts after a very simple kiss on the cheek, and when they’re thrown together in public, Meg discovers the real person behind the photographs, and West begins to wonder how he can live his real life without her in it. Nothing is simple when it seems like the world is watching. You can preorder Exposure wherever eBooks are sold, and thank you to Tracy Ewens for sponsoring this episode!
The music you’re listening to is provided by Sassy Outwater, and I will have information at the end of the podcast as to where you can find this and all the other songs we feature.
Plus, if you’re looking for past episodes, you can go to iTunes.com/DBSA for a complete collection of previous episodes with the books that we mention each, in each of them, excuse me.
Plus, if you’ve got some questions or you want to leave a comment, you can always find us on smartbitchestrashybooks.com/podcast!
And now, without any further delay, on with the podcast.
[music]
Sarah: Good morning!
Bea: Fitzwilliam, would you like to say good morning too?
Fitzwilliam: BARK!
Leah: Oh! Oh, my God!
[Laughter]
Sarah: Was that him?
Bea and Leah: Yeah!
Sarah: Hey, Fitz! Good morning to you! Elyse?
Bea: Fitz and I have many thoughts on The Bachelor. [Laughs]
Sarah: You know, one of my questions is actually, what did Fitz think? Elyse, are you here?
Elyse: I am here. I’m just speechless because I’m podcasting with the Fitzwilliam Waffles.
Sarah: Oh.
Leah: Hi, Elyse! Hi, Elyse! Hi!
Bea: He loooves podcasting; it’s his favorite!
Leah: Yep.
Bea: Mostly ‘cause we sit there and he gets a snuggle fest. [Laughs]
Sarah: Okay, ladies, so tell me: how was this season of The Bachelor, and should I name this episode “A Bachelor Most Viall”?
Bea: Yeah.
Leah: Yeah.
Bea: But I also think that’s probably been done.
Sarah: All right, that’s definitely not original.
Bea: Here’s how I feel about this season of The Bachelor –
Leah: That’s Bea.
Bea: This is Bea. It was a good season without the, without the main guy.
[Laughter]
Bea: Nick Viall, whatever, and Vanessa, to be quite frank, and the other girls were amazing! We loved Raven, we love Rachel, and Corinne is an amazing villain, so kudos, Bachelor producers for your casting. Nick, we’re done with you. We never want to see you on another Bachelor show again.
Leah: Yeah. This is Leah –
Elyse: Nick, Nick reminds me of, like, he’s like leftover meatloaf. Like, you’re going to eat it because it’s there, but you’re not excited about it at all.
Bea: Yeah.
Leah: Yeah, so we, so we have a whole crew who watches The Bachelor on Monday nights at our house, people we went to college with and some childhood friends, and so it was very split when he was announced as the Bachelor. Some people were excited, and me was not excited.
Bea: Yeah! [Laughs]
Leah: I, I feel like everyone was excited but me.
Bea: Leah was –
Leah: I was like, why are we giving this dude a fourth chance?!
Bea: Yes, that’s exactly what she said. She’s a bit bitter.
Leah: Well, and he, he was so terrible on, I, I still haven’t forgiven him for slut-shaming Andi –
Bea: Yeah.
Leah: – like, three years ago for daring to have sex with him when she was considering marrying him. My God! How dare she?! And I don’t think he deserved his whole own season of The Bachelor, and it, he was boring.
Elyse: Right, so, for people who haven’t watched the show, on The Bachelorette, they’re, we, we get the Fantasy Suites portion. So she slept with him, and presumably three other guys, and did not pick him in the end, and he made a comment on air about, why would you have sex with me if you weren’t going to marry me? Well, this all leads back to my thesis that Nick is really shitty in bed, right, because, okay –
Bea or Leah: Yeah.
Leah or Bea: [Laughs]
Elyse: – there’s that. Then he, he slept with a woman named Liz after a wedding – this was all before the show – she comes on The Bachelor, and he gets rid of her super, super fast because she’s talking to other women about the fact that they had sex. And apparently after they had sex, off in real life, not on the show, she declined to give her, him her phone number ‘cause she didn’t want to see him again at that time. Again, all supporting my theory that he’s just really crap in bed.
Leah: That? I, that seems like a good theory! [Laughs]
Bea: Yeah, and that whole episode was so bizarre. It was like, why would she not give him her – like, I agree, why hadn’t she given him her number if she was interested and then come on a TV show? It was –
Leah: Well –
Bea: – a bit odd.
Leah: – she was not There for the Right Reasons™.
Bea: But! But he also wasn’t right in the way he treated her. So no one came out looking good, and it wasn’t a great – I, I, I didn’t love that little story arc. [Laughs]
Leah or Sarah: Mm-hmm.
Elyse: One of the things that kind of bothers me about The Bachelor that I don’t think it’s – so it’s, what, like, ten years old now? Not like our society’s mores have shifted a lot in ten years, but it still kind of has a very antiquated view about sex, and when it first started, it took itself super seriously, and it’s a little more tongue in cheek now?
Someone: Yeah.
Elyse: But you know that people on this show are having sex with each other. I would contend that in the mansion there are people having sex with each other who aren’t the Bachelor, right?
Bea or Leah: Absolutely!
Elyse: You know sex is happening.
Bea or Leah: Of course!
Elyse: And nobody really cares. Nobody cares that you slept with this guy before the show. Nobody cares that maybe you have sex in the Fantasy Suite. Adults have sex. They have sex without considering being in a relationship together. They have sex just ‘cause it feels good. Nobody fucking cares.
Leah: We did all comment this season that they, especially leading up to the Fantasy Suite, they were all a lot more frank about what was about to happen?
Bea: Well, I think that was because Nick was cast as this, like, extremely sexual –
Leah: [Snort]
Elyse: Yeah.
Bea: – Bachelor. Did, did anyone – it was really weird. It was like they talked about sex more this season –
Bea: Yeah!
Bea: – than I think they ever have.
Leah: But that was good! Because I don’t like it when they’re like, oh, in the Fantasy Suite we’re just going to talk!
Bea: I agree, but it was weird that it, like, came at the expense of Nick’s, like, other – like, he didn’t really have another personality trait.
Leah: Well, does he actually have a personality?
Elyse: Well, and it cracks me up that they cast him as being, like, this super sexual guy who slept with all these people, because I don’t think it’s true; I think he’s probably slept with a normal amount of people.
Bea or Leah: Right!
Elyse: But also, the guy can’t fucking sit on a couch correctly. He’s got no coordination. Like, he’s not, he’s not Don Juan. I, he’s not, he’s not going to be able to manage two erogenous zones at the same time, that’s all I’m saying. Like –
Bea: Really good call.
Elyse: Right, yeah, he’s, it’s, it’s not great. When Raven said that she had never had an orgasm, which, by the way – so, if you didn’t watch the show, Raven is amazing, and I love her, and I hope she gets her own show, because she’s hilarious –
Bea: Very interesting as well.
Leah: And she’s a small business owner, so we like that that.
Bea: Yes, we love that.
Elyse: Yes.
Leah: But it was a much deeper Raven than may have been portrayed on the TV show. I was very impressed by what I found there. [Laughs] Just, like, lots of nice posts! Well, she’s from Hoxie, Arkansas, so she, like, did this post about the integration of the schools, ‘cause that’s the first place they integrated? And, like, about how she couldn’t be there, but she really wanted to ‘cause it meant a lot to be from that hometown. It was just a really nice thing to say on a day that, like, wasn’t getting national attention. It wasn’t, like, everyone was like, oh, today’s the day, and she made a post about it, and she just, like, is going back home and talking about her employees and how amazing they are running the story while she wasn’t there, and obviously we feel some – [laughs] – kinship to Raven!
Bea: Yes!
Leah: Being a small business owner. But I like Raven.
Bea: I do not want her to go on Paradise! I’m concerned!
Sarah: I have, I have, I have two questions: one, one thing that I – ‘cause I do not watch the, the show. I – [sighs] – I like to work out my own abs, but not by cringing –
[Laughter]
Sarah: – and so reality TV – [laughs] – is not for me. But I, I am also not one of those people who’s like, oh, my God, you suck ‘cause you watch reality TV, because I spend a lot of time defending romance against that same thing and should not do it myself. So I can’t watch cringe television; it’s just, I, I can’t do it.
Bea or Leah: Yeah –
Sarah: But I have two things that I constantly hear.
Bea or Leah: Yeah?
Sarah: One is – you guys just brought it up a second ago – being there for “the Right Reasons.” What are the Right Reasons? Is there an understood code of conduct that part of the tension of the show is them not adhering to that code of conduct?
Bea: It’s actually the same thing as romance. It’s True Love™.
Leah: Looove! Love is real!
Bea: It’s, it’s True Love™. You, you cannot be there to get famous. You cannot be there to make friends. You cannot be there to do any of the things that make the TV show good.
Leah: To, to get, as Elyse very correctly points out, free vacation.
Sarah: Oh!
Bea: Free vacay, Instagram followers, any of those things. Those –
Leah: The only reason you are there is to fall in love with one person who you may or may not actually like when you meet in person.
Bea: Right. Which is why we –
Sarah: [Laughs]
Bea: – particularly love Bachelor in Paradise, ‘cause that shit is not even, it’s, Bachelor in Paradise is a mess. There are no –
Leah: Right, the code goes away.
Bea: Yes, the code goes away. There are no rules, and they’re all there, like, with, with the express purpose of, we’re going to be on a TV show together and get more Instagram followers.
Leah: And also have a lot of free drinks.
Bea: And some of us are going to have sex. We’re going to have free drinks. The, the producers are definitely going to make fun of us. It’s much more tongue in cheek. Like, one time they edited this girl talking to a raccoon.
Leah: Yeah, it’s amazing!
[Laughter]
Bea: ‘Cause she was talking to a producer off camera, and they cut out the producer and, like, stone-cold edited in a raccoon to make her look funny, and it was crazy.
[Laughter]
Sarah: What was – so, is that on every year, or is that, like, is that sort of like the intermission between The Bachelor and The Bachelorette?
Bea: – intermission for the summer show.
Leah: So, The Bachelor cycle goes –
Sarah: Oh, God, it has a cycle?
Bea and Leah: Yes.
Leah: The Bachelor is in January, the, The Bachelorette is one of the top four-ish girls from that, and that starts usually April, May, and then Bachelor in Paradise is in August, and it’s cast-offs from those two seasons, plus the last couple of seasons?
Bea: If there were any, like, fan favorites.
Leah: Right, of The Bachelor, and then, unfortunately, we have to suffer through the fall without anything, and then it starts over in January.
Sarah: So the Right Reasons for The Bachelor and The Bachelorette are to find True Love, capital T, capital L, ™, with a little R in a little circle. Like –
Leah: Yeah!
Sarah: – you’re genuinely there to at least pretend convincingly that you are interested in finding a permanent life relationship with this person in front of, you know, umpty-twelve producers, cameramen, crew, grips, makeup, and, and soundstage people.
Elyse: Going back, again, when it first started, it took itself really, really seriously, and I think there is an acknowledgement now that it is happening on two levels, as weird as that sounds, so there’s the –
Sarah: No, that’s exactly what I was trying to figure out is –
Elyse: Yes. There is, there’s –
Sarah: – is there a second level?
Elyse: Yeah, so there’s the level like, I’m not here to make friends. I’m, I’m here for Nick, I’m here for whatever, but then there’s the level that is still really transparent that you’re here for some level of exposure. You know, all of these women are too good for him, absolutely. They’re all super attractive, super accomplished, intelligent. Most of them are really well spoken. Like, they, none of them need to show up to this show to find a partner, and so that’s an elaborate fiction, and you get, like, these little glimpses of what’s going on behind the scenes. Like, there was a comment on, like, “The Women Tell All” special. So Liz had really, the, the show had really played up the fact that she had had sex with Nick, like to the point where I thought they were going to come out and, like, paint a scarlet letter on her?
Sarah: [Laughs]
Elyse: And – it was so ridiculous! – and after, during the special, one of the women stood up and said, you know, she, like, kind of pointed the finger at ABC and said, you know, the world just knows you as someone who had sex with Nick, but, you know, we know you as someone who’s been raising money to, to build wells and build orphanages, and you’re amazing, and it turned out, like, the women are, they communicate with each other after they leave the show, and it, there’s definitely a level, I think of friendship, and we’re going to go on vacation with other cool women, and he’s, he’s really kind of an, an also-ran.
Leah: I, I felt like there was a distinct possibility during “The Women Tell All” that they were going to revolt against ABC. They kept –
Bea or Elyse: Yes.
Leah: – they kept each, each woman, they would, like, bring up to the – this is what they really call it – hot seat, and they would, like, you know, bring up whatever her great scandal of the season was? And then all of the women would be like, who cares?! We like her anyway!
Bea: Yeah. Except for the few who are trying to make a name for themselves so that they can get on Paradise – Hailey, I’m looking at you.
Elyse: There’s always one persons who’s very obviously out there to do whatever they need to do to get fast reality TV famous.
Leah: Right. And, and there’s a very set cast, so if you haven’t watched UnREAL and you’re, you’re not a fan of The Bachelor, I would recommend it. It, it’s a show, a scripted show about The Bachelor producers, and it really, like, it’s written by a woman who was formerly a Bachelor producer, so it really does kind of show what they’re doing behind the scenes, and we comment on, our viewing party talks a lot about what –
Bea: How people are being manipulated.
Leah: – what the producers are doing to get people to say and do the ridiculous things they’re saying and doing.
Bea: Right, the thing people don’t understand about The Bachelor is these women are put in the mansion. They’re not allowed television, books, magazines. They literally have nothing to do all day.
Leah: They’re given makeup, and they, like, do each other –
Bea: And alcohol.
Leah: That’s why they all have crazy nails all the time, ‘cause they’re always painting their nails, and they all do their hair.
Sarah: [Laughs]
Bea: They’re wasted.
Leah: They just sit –
Elyse: Mm-hmm.
Leah: – they’re, like, literally not allowed to entertain themselves except by –
Bea: Oh, and they can work out. They all –
Sarah: It’s like a dollhouse!
Bea and Leah: Yeah.
Bea: It’s, it’s really a bizarre situation, so it totally makes sense that the girls would bond; however, that doesn’t mean they’re then go against their set role in the cast, so even, it’s – which is what’s interesting, and I think Elyse said this, they talk and are friends afterwards, and you see the villain, like, absorbed into the group, so we’ve seen, like, nice posts about Corinne from all of these girls, and you’re like, wait, she was awful! But, you know, she was cast as that by the producers. She was supposed to be the villain. That doesn’t mean that they all think she’s, like, actually that person.
Elyse: Right.
Sarah: This is very Regency-esque. So, like, you know, in the Regency, I think it was Adele Smith who pointed out that, you know, in, in the Regency, courtship is happening in public. So you’re trying to be alone with all of these forces that are actually trying to keep you apart that actually want you to be together, but only in prescribed ways, so with the, with the, with the –
Bea or Leah: That’s pretty accurate!
Sarah: – with the, with the house, with the, with the Bachelor contestants in the mansion, they are being manipulated by the producers and have to undermine what the producers are doing by helping each other, while at the same time supporting what the producers are doing because that’s what they’ve “been hired to do,” or that’s why they’re there.
Bea: Also, you can see very clearly that they believe that the producers are their friends.
Sarah: Uh-oh.
Bea: And that is –
Sarah: That seems bad.
Bea: – perhaps true to some extent; some of them definitely, I’m sure, create friendships with the producers. They also, because, of the cycle of shows now, they are trying to befriend the producers so they can get on the next show. The producers aren’t going to cast some girl who was a horrible witch the entire time to them.
Sarah and Elyse: Right.
Bea: They don’t want to work with people like that, unless they’re amazing TV, in which case they’ll deal with it, but that’s a whole other thing. So you can see the girls, like, buddying up to the producers in the hopes that then they get on Paradise and then they get their own season. The, the, the pinnacle is getting your own season.
Leah: Right, but you have to be, like –
Bea: It’s really bizarre.
Sarah: It’s almost as if you’re watching two shows. You’re watching what’s happening on the screen, and then you’re trying to figure out what’s happening behind the scenes.
Bea: Yeah.
Leah: It’s like six shows.
Bea: Yeah, and there’s, there’s lots of other elements, ‘cause we don’t, we don’t read spoilers, but other people read spoilers, and the spoilers frequently feature, like, a lot of behind-the-scenes information. Like, this, these people hated each other, or this is what all the girls actually thought about this girl, because they all go and talk to each other, and there’s this thing called the Bachelor Family, which is the network of people who have been on these shows for ten years.
Sarah: Can you imagine that WhatsApp, or that, that WhatsApp chat group? Like, Emma Watson was saying during the press tour of Beauty and the Beast that she created a group just of the Harry Potter cast so they can all talk to each other, which whoever wants to read that, I’m right in line. I mean, it’s totally an invasion of their privacy, but that must be amazing! I wonder if there’s a similar one for Bachelor contestants.
Elyse: I think that the women are a lot more supportive and a lot closer than the producers want to let us see, because there’ve been a lot of moments on the show where, like, you catch kind of these glimpses that they haven’t edited out, like, you know, there was one where one of the women was, she was having a hard time, she was getting kind of emotional, and she was crying and just struggling with it, and, you know, they were like, you’re beautiful, you’re amazing, you have this! Don’t worry about it, you know, it’s going to be fine. And you’re thinking, okay, so supposedly, if you guys are competing against each other, why are you guys in the bathroom with her rubbing her back and telling her she’s beautiful and amazing? So you get these glimpses that, you know, they, they try to, like you said, they portray this very Regency-esque courtship ritual, but that’s not really what’s going on. And I think they also kind of, one of the things that I’ve, I’ve always wondered about is, like, why is everyone crying? Why is everyone so stressed out? My understanding is they really compress filming, so everyone’s, like, super exhausted while this is going on. They’re all operating on, like, four hours of sleep a night.
Sarah: Oh, dude, I would cry! I’d cry on the hour. No problem.
Elyse: Right.
Sarah: Sign me up.
Bea or Leah: They’re, they’re drunk.
Sarah: They’re drunk and they’re tired.
Elyse: Yeah, they’re drunk! [Laughs] Yeah.
Bea: And they’re, yeah, that’s exactly right! I think the friendships are, are most, the most interesting, because you, you do see glimpses of it. One example: Raven was, in the final episode before Rachel kicked off, Raven’s, like, holding this note, and, and viewers notice it, and they were like, what’s with the note? Who, who gave Raven a note? Is it from Nick? Oh, my God, duh-duh-duh! It was from Rachel. She’d written her a letter, like, saying goodbye to her, basically, and had it ready so that she, she, if she got kicked off, she could say everything she wanted to say to Raven. Because they were, like, that, they had become that close.
Sarah: Ohhh!
Bea: That’s not something that they would have highlighted, because it doesn’t make sense; if they are both in love with this man, why would they be forming this close friendship? It, it just doesn’t make sense with the story, but that’s actually what happened.
Sarah: And then there’s the tension of, all of these women are supposed to be competing with each other, which, you know, traditional portrayals are almost always that women compete against each other terribly, and then beneath that you have genuine support and competition at the same time. You have this, this tension of which one is the actual reality?
Bea: Right.
Elyse: You know, I don’t think that anyone ends the show with actually being in love with each other –
[Laughter]
Elyse: – ever.
Sarah: No –
Elyse: I mean, I think, I mean, honestly, I think there could be, like, a level of infatuation or sexual attraction, but it’s not like you’ve spent enough time together to be in love, and so I don’t think that there’s as much tension between the women as you would think, because I don’t think they’re as emotionally invested in this guy as the, the series makes it out to be. I mean, what, how much time do you think they actually spend with him one on one throughout, like, the season, if you make it to the end?
Bea: Someone tallied up the hours. So they film for six weeks. That’s, that’s the length of this relationship. You’re traveling all the time, and they don’t travel together. So it’s not like, they’re, like, spending long hours together that we don’t see. They’re kept apart; Nick is kept separate from the women.
Leah: Got to be, like, a sum total of, like, three days –
Bea: Yeah.
Leah: – or something, and –
Elyse: Right.
Bea: They, they –
Leah: – you probably had three dates with this person. [Laughs]
Bea: Right, so, I think people have genuinely fallen in love with each other after the show.
Elyse: Right!
Bea: ‘Cause they maybe, like, became really close, and they really enjoyed each other and then were able to take themselves out of this situation and build a relationship. The, the relationships that have survived do not survive in Hollywood, Nick Dancing with the Stars.
Elyse: Right.
Bea: Wants to be an actor. That’s not going to work! You, you have to take yourself out of that entertainment industry.
Elyse: It’s, I think probably my favorite Bachelor was Sean Lowe?
Leah: Yes!
Bea: Oh, Sean.
Elyse: Because –
Leah: Their first success story!
Bea: Oh, no, my favorite –
Elyse: Right!
Bea: – is Desiree and Chris.
Elyse: But when he was with Catherine on the show, like, when you saw them together, it was, it was much less scripted, and it was like goofy, awkward.
Bea or Leah: Yeah.
Elyse: They’re just being dorks together, and it’s like, oh, that’s really what it looks like when you start falling in love with someone where it’s not, it’s not camera-ready! Like, you’re kind of giggly and stupid and dorky.
Bea: Sean is a really good example of who this can work for. He’s a religious guy, so, so he was ready to be married, and he, he was really smart about how he made his decision, and, and I think the producers have spoken about that. So Fitz loves The Bachelor. He does it on his Instagram story, he does all his reactions to what’s happening, and he was a big fan of Corinne this season, who I don’t think we’ve given enough air time to today.
[Laughter]
Elyse: Did you see the Dog Bachelor?
Bea: Oh, my God –
Bea and Leah: WHAT?!
Elyse: Okay, so, I can’t remember what I have to – I’ll start looking it up. It’s some rescue that they did a Dog Bachelor where they cast all these women, and they’re, like, sitting around a living room drinking wine? And they’re, then they go on dates with the dog to see who – it’s a Santa Fe animal rescue – to see who, who the dog will pick to be their adopted mom, and it is hilarious and the best thing on earth. I’ll send you a link, Sarah, so you can link at the end of the podcast. I can’t remember what the dog’s name is, but they’re all, like, you know, if Cody doesn’t pick me to take him home, you know, my heart’ll be broken, and, like, I believe more convincingly that these women are emotionally invested in who this dog will allegedly choose to be their adopted mom than I do in the actual Bachelor.
Sarah: [Laughs]
Bea or Leah: That sounds so good; I cannot wait to watch it.
Leah or Bea: – the dog’s amazing.
Sarah: So how do you guys see this relating to romance as a genre? ‘Cause you said earlier, I think it was Bea that you, who said this, that, that The Bachelor is very much like a romance novel structurally, that there’s –
Bea: Yeah.
Sarah: – there’s an established structure wherein things happen, and everyone understands the structure, and then what goes on inside the structure is different every time. Is that, is that the similarity you see, or was it a different sort of way these fit together?
Bea: Yeah, I mean, I see a lot of the story arcs that we see in romance in The Bachelor seasons. They, they definitely manufacture these particular storylines, and I think like any good drama, any good media shares those, those same themes, so I think it’s, it’s as simple as that, but I do think, I mean, we don’t really believe in the ending, so it, it’s a little different in that. I, I don’t know.
Leah: It depends. Some, some seasons we, we’ve rooted for them to make it – not this one.
Bea: Yeah.
Leah: I think it’s a similar, it’s similar to romance in that it’s something that groups of women enjoy together –
Bea: Yeah.
Leah: – and have fun with and are frequently shamed for when it’s really, like, let’s not be so serious about our reality television.
Bea: Well, I think that’s a really – so, we watch The Bachelor with a, a group of women, and it’s been growing and changing, and it’s a really special thing for us every Monday to bring everyone together. We cook, and we all hang out, and when we don’t have it, we don’t see those people as much, and –
Sarah: Mm-hmm.
Bea: – it’s, it’s really nice that every week everyone makes time for something like that. So that’s the, probably the most special part to us. The –
Leah: Right, and I think a lot, Bachelor Nation is made up of big and small viewing parties, I think, a – and also, if you watch The Bachelor by yourself, it’s kind of depressing.
Bea: [Laughs] Yeah, sometimes we don’t have our viewing party, and we all try and watch it separately, and we’re like, uh, but –
Leah: [Laughs] It’s not as fun if you can’t –
Bea: Yeah, we yell at the screen, we have opinions, we, we fill out brackets. We, like, make it this kind of like whole ritual thing, so that’s what’s special about it for us.
Sarah: And Elyse, you watch it while drinking.
Elyse: I do watch it while drinking. It’s a lot more fun when you’re mildly drunk. Like, you have to hit that, everything’s kind of warm and I’m just a tiny bit sleepy drunk, ‘cause if you go too far in the other direction, I find I just get mad, I get rum rage. You know, I started watching it a few years ago, and it was one of those things where, like, my husband came into the room and, like, was, what the fuck is this? And then he sits down and starts watching it with me and gets super invested?
Bea or Leah: Oh, yeah.
Elyse: And, so now he pretends like he’s put out by it every time it’s on, but he’s secretly one thousand percent there for the crazy sauce, and I think that’s why I like it, because, like, you said, it does have a very romance-novel structure, except you’re not as invested in the happy ending. You’re there for all of the goofy shit that happens throughout the season. Like, I can’t remember the name –
Elyse: I’m sorry; what was that?
Leah: Sorry, it’s like a crazypants romance.
Elyse: It is! It’s –
Leah: Like the ones that are just like, what?!
Elyse: But you can’t put it down, because it’s –
Bea or Leah: Yeah.
Elyse: – so delightful. Like, there was one sea-, I think it was Sean’s season where there was one woman who, I don’t know if they just really edited this shit out of everything she was on or she was that, like, just – I remember at one point he was talking to one of the other women, and she’s, like, crouched in a dark corner of a poolroom rocking back and forth talking to herself?
Leah: Was that Ashley? Or, no, was it Tierra?
Elyse: It was Tierra, I think.
Leah: That would steal her sparkle.
Elyse: Yes! And it was uninten-, you know, it was, I don’t know how to describe it. It was just, it was hilarious! It sounds really mean to say that, but it was really, she knew what was going on, and she knew how she was being cast, and she was like, you know what? I’m going to up my game to, like, we’re going to turn this up to 11.
Leah: [Laughs] Yeah, I like the women who, like, really go gung-ho with it and just go full-on crazy. Like, they’re the ones who frequently feature the most.
Sarah: And they create sort of a character of themselves.
Elyse: Right, and –
Leah: Exactly. They have, like, characters, like Corinne’s nanny was a, a part of her – okay, so for the people who didn’t watch, Corinne had a nanny, but it was basically just like a personal assistant who she still called her nanny. I don’t know; it was weird. But they really focused on it and made her talk about it all the time, and always edited it so it looked like all the other women were talking about it all the time. It, they probably weren’t talking about it that much, but they edited the ten minutes they were into the ten minutes of the TV show.
Elyse: Right, and I think, you know, they made it out to be like, oh, she’s an adult woman who still has a nanny, and then when she was actually interviewed, I think in “The Women Tell All,” what she talked about was the fact that this woman had worked for her family for years and that she had been a very important, like, maternal figure in her life and that Corinne’s mom had been diagnosed with ovarian cancer and had gotten so sick that at one point they were actually making funeral arrangements. She, she did live, she made it, and she said, you know, I could not have survived this, my family could not have survived this without Raquel being there, holding the family together, and she said, I don’t feel comfortable calling her, like, a domestic worker or a cleaning lady, because that is not what she is, and so I called her a nanny, and maybe I misspoke, and so I think, you know, you get to, you kind of get the, the actual truth of what’s going on behind the scenes and not what the producers are making it out to be.
Leah: There’s so much, so many more layers.
Elyse: Right, there’s a ton of layers, and I think that’s part of the fun too, is trying to figure out what’s actually happening versus what we think, or what the producers want us to think is happening.
Leah: Yeah. I think you, you have to kind of have some context for it, and you can’t watch it alone. You kind of have to know what’s going on other, otherwise. Otherwise they look like such terrible people.
Bea or Elyse: And they do!
Leah: And they’re clearly not. There’s so much more happening.
Elyse: I would, I would argue that Nick is legitimately a terrible person. He’s kind of like, he’s very dudebro-ish on the show, which is not appealing, and one of the things that he, I think one of the things that really bothered me about him, and maybe it was just the way they edited it, was that he was very, he, he was very invested in the fact that the women were here for his entertainment or his amusement or whatever, you know, they were doing, and when it wasn’t working out for him, he would have this, like, little tantrum, and it’s like, okay, well, you’ve also got thirty women who are coming on this show and have pretty substantial odds of being rejected publicly on television and are being asked to compete with each other on very little sleep, so you can just shut the fuck up, Nick.
Bea: [Laughs]
Leah: Yes, agreed. Agreed!
Bea: And towards the end, every time they were together, we were all like, they look so unhappy –
Elyse or Leah: Right!
Bea: – in each others’ presence.
Elyse: I could not figure out – I mean, so he was down to two women, he was down to Raven and Vanessa, and Raven is all like, I’m so excited for our future together, and Vanessa’s fucking sobbing, like hysterical sobbing because she’s pretty sure this is a bad idea. I’m, they, they have to be broken up now. Like, I don’t believe they’re still together.
Bea or Leah: No way.
Elyse: Or that they like each other at all.
Sarah: When I saw your recap of the, you know, After the Bachelor and you realize (a) that they don’t really spend that much time with each other after the show, the filming comes to an end and, like, well, are you still together, and they’re both like, yeah, baby steps. I’m like, are those baby steps backwards or forwards?
Bea: Oh, my God. The “After the Final Rose” was one of the most brutal interviews I’ve ever seen, and we’ve seen some pretty embattled couples up there. I’m thinking just of last season’s JoJo and fucking Jordan, who are –
Leah: I sensibly still forget that.
Bea: I swear a lot, sorry! They –
Sarah: That’s totally fine! You –
Elyse: Right, have, have you, have you heard me?
Sarah: Have you, have you read the name of the site?
Bea: Yes, I forget who I’m talking to. [Laughs]
Leah: It was terrible!
Bea: ‘Cause they can’t answer the most basic questions, like –
Bea and Leah: – where are you going to live?
Sarah: [Laughs]
Elyse: Again, she looks –
Bea: She doesn’t want to move to LA. She doesn’t want to move to LA! Her whole family is in Canada. She clearly loves living there and doesn’t want to leave! And –
Sarah: Yes, but he has to go dance with the stars like a baby dinosaur! He has priorities!
Elyse: And the other thing is, she has a legitimate, successful, interesting career in Montreal, and his job is reality television, right, so he’s got, like, another year before he ages out. Like, she’s actually invested in something substantial up there.
Leah: Yeah, and I think, he’s probably, that’s probably the conversation they’re having right now, and she’s probably saying, you know, I went on this show, but I’m not really interested in having a lifetime of reality TV, and he’s kind of like, look, I want to be an actor, and I want to be a host, and this is kind of the way I have to do it, because I’m not a good actor –
Sarah: [Laughs]
Leah: – and against the reality of their lives, so I think we’re going to see a breakup pretty soon.
Elyse: Yeah, and I, I don’t mean to offend you ladies, because I know you are in LA, but the fact, the fact that he is picking LA over Montreal speaks a lot to me just about his decision-making skills.
Leah: No, and, and he, if, if you come to LA and want to be in the entertainment business, there are realities about that, and I, he’s been here for a little while. I’m sure he knows that. And, and that’s just like a separate world. It, it’s a weird world, and we have nothing to do with it, but it’s, it’s here, and it’s a, it’s a big part of this city. I think there’s definitely something to be said for –
Bea: Yeah, and regardless of the cities of LA versus Montreal – I’ve never been to Montreal; I hear it’s nice – her entire family lives there, and she’s very, they have lunch every Sunday, which sounds nice!
Elyse: Well, not only that – Nick, you could flee to Canada right now. There are so many people who want to flee to Canada right now. Have you seen what Justin Trudeau looks like? Go! Go now!
Bea: Run, don’t walk!
Leah: He hugs pandas!
Elyse: [Sighs] Yeah.
Bea: He’s, he’s not the sharpest tool in the shed.
Sarah: But he’s certainly a tool.
[Laughter]
Leah: He, he is a tool, but he’s not a really sharp one.
Bea: Anyway, have you heard what she’s been saying about what she wants to do now?
Sarah: She wants to start a charity, right?
Bea: So that’s another thing that has become a part of Bachelor Nation. Several of the ex-contestants have started these charitable foundations. I’m thinking particularly of Sarah Herron, who has the, what is it called, SheLift, I think. It’s for girls with disabilities, and they all kind of, like, go to fundraisers for it and Instagram about it, and I’m sure raise some good money for a cause, so if she wants to harness Bachelor Nation like that, fine. Do I think Vanessa is the kind of person who will be happy doing that? No. And, and I think she told us that herself, that, that that’s not, she doesn’t want that kind of life, but that’s what she supposedly says she’s setting herself up for.
Sarah: See, that just makes me sad. Like, she has to make all the change and adjustment because he wants to be on reality television.
Bea: Yeah. Yeah, and that’s fucked! It’s just not – and, and it’s difficult to root for a couple, and I think we all, I think the, the general feeling in Bachelor Nation was it’s difficult to root for a couple where you’re clearly making such a huge sacrifice that you don’t really want to make and he’s not even, like, thanking you for it or acknowledging the sacrifice you’re make.
Sarah: Why would he not choose the person who really wanted to be with him? Like, did he give any indication as to his actual feelings or that he had any? Or that he knows what those are?
Elyse: Sarah, Sarah. Sarah, he can’t sit sideways on a couch.
Sarah: That’s right, I forgot! I forgot; I’m sorry. What am I thinking?
Bea: It’s hard! His head, his head does not make the decisions –
Elyse: No.
Bea: – his heart makes the decisions.
Leah: Yeah.
Elyse: It’s not his heart making the decisions. Vanessa rocks a push-up bra like nobody’s fucking business.
Bea: Vanessa’s bod-, body be banging.
Leah: But so is Raven’s!
Bea: Yeah, that’s true. Raven was so hot!
Leah: And I loved Raven, and also she was, like, bubbly and fun, and, like, they were kind of fun together!
Bea: Yeah, that’s an interesting thing. Okay, so –
Elyse: So –
Bea: – she –
Elyse: – I’m like, I am, I am super, super straight on the Kinsey scale. I’d fucking marry Raven.
Bea and Leah: Yes!
Bea: She’s fun.
Leah: She seemed like she would be really fun to marry! [Laughs]
Bea: And, and, and she, she wouldn’t –
Leah: She’d be grateful for every orgasm!
Bea: Well, but she was down to move to LA and try out Dancing with the Stars for a season, and then they could do something else! She’s, like, down for it. Vanessa is not.
Elyse: But he did talk about, and actually his family talked about it too, that he is very attracted to very strong-willed kind of – I don’t like using the word domineering because I think it’s intended to make women seem mean? – but kind of strong-willed, assertive, domineering women, and then his family points out he’s attracted to these type of women, but then he’s not willing to make any compromises, and it just turns into, like, a nuclear situation where everything explodes. So I think he has a type that does not, but he, he doesn’t know how to manage a relationship according to that type, and if we’re talking about romance novels, someone would write a romance novel, like an erotic romance novel where he just meets the, the female Domme of his dreams.
Bea and Leah: Yeah.
Bea: Vanessa, like, she was a more difficult character to cast, be-, because she had a lot of different sides to her. She could be sweet, she could be difficult, and, and so they kind of, like, didn’t know what to do with her, and they bounced around with her edit, and so I think it was difficult to, like, believe that Nick was falling in love with her because we weren’t really seeing any side of her, except when she yelled at him about Corinne. And I, and we, we watched the show with Rebekah Weatherspoon, and she said that’s the moment Nick fell in love. [Laughs]
Elyse: He to-, the minute she called him to the carpet for his shitty behavior, he popped a boner so hard.
Bea: He was like, ooh, I love that! And so he made a choice really early on that Vanessa was, was the girl for him, and then he kind of didn’t deviate from that.
Elyse: But I mean, if you look at, I mean, Andi, who he supposedly fell in love with, came on at the end to yell at him too! Like, I think he just really likes brunettes who yell at him, and that’s okay.
Sarah: [Laughs] Oh, yeah, he wants a woman, it sounds like from many, from my completely unqualified perspective –
[Laughter]
Sarah: I have no business offering an opinion, but I’m not going to stop! Why would I do – duh!
Bea or Leah: [laughter]
Sarah: He, it sounds like he wants someone who is determined to be, be independent and strong and make decisions for themselves, and what he wants is for that person to both simultaneously be dominant over him but then also to choose him.
Bea or Leah: Yeah!
Elyse: Right.
Bea: And, and, and he does want them to be submissive to his, to some things.
Leah: He wants them to, like, move to the city he wants to live in and go along with his life plans, but also be bossed around in other ways, so I would imagine it’s a very difficult position for his partner to be in, ‘cause it’s kind of like, what do you want, bro?
Elyse: But that’s, you know what, that’s such a legitimate thing. Like, I have found professionally that there is a certain measure of success I have achieved because, like, well-to-do successful professional dudes, the meaner I am to them, the more they’re into it. They’re like, we’re going to promote her! She’s mean to me! I like it!
Sarah: That’s seriously, if you unpack that for about half an hour, you’re nowhere near the bottom of that bowl.
Elyse: Oh, God no! No, no.
Sarah: Whoa. So are you going to watch The Bachelorette, and are you going to watch Bachelor in Paradise? Like, are you, are you both in for the, the complete cycle? The cycle of rings? It’s different rings, though.
Bea: We are. Paradise? Our viewing party kind of falls apart, and –
Leah: They may be more invested this year. [Laughs]
Bea: They may be more invested.
Leah: We got a lot of people hooked. I will say, we are, I don’t think we’ve ever been so excited for a Bachelorette as we are for Rachel.
Bea: Oh, my God.
Leah: She is so poised and cool and fun.
Bea: She’s so fun!
Leah: And her family seems cool, and we’re really excited, and we’re not, obviously, ignoring the fact that she is the first black Bachelorette, which is obviously five years too late, but I guess better late than never.
Sarah: The potential cringe factor, though, like, I, I’m going to go black and I’m not going to go back?
Bea and Leah: So terrible!
Sarah: That’s a thing that somebody not only said out, out, out loud but then was put on television? Like, listen, I’m going to break one of my abdomen muscles!
Bea or Leah: Yeah.
Elyse: He said it on live television. They didn’t have the opportunity to edit that out.
Sarah: Jesus!
Bea: That was brutal.
Leah: I think we woke up our neighbors; like, ten women just screamed at the top of their lungs.
Bea: Screamed bloody murder. The only other time we screamed was when they brought out the puppies for Raven to play with.
[Laughter]
Elyse: Yes.
Leah: But, like, can I just say, you give one woman a date where you’re playing with puppies and you give another woman a date where you’re ducking her in icy water?
Bea: [Laughs] Yeah!
Leah: Who do you want to spend more time – like, what?!
[Laughter]
Leah: Dick!
Elyse: Not only that, my favorite part is they did the icy water date, like, the afternoon before they’re supposedly going to sleep together. Like, you know his balls have not descended yet. Like –
[Laughter]
Elyse: One of the things that I find super interesting on the show, ‘cause – so one of the things that really annoys me is when people get bitchy about the show, specifically men, and they’re like, see, women just want a hot guy that’s going to be, like, rich and they’ll, they’ll compete for that, and it’s all superficial, so –
Sarah: I was just going to ask you about this part. Yes, bring it!
Elyse: – so first of all, first of all, women’s bodies have been commodified for marriage and all kinds of other things for thousands and thousands of years, so you can shut the fuck up and sit down, like, right now. If a bunch of women want to compete for a hot guy, that’s their fucking business. But I do think it’s really interesting that the show creates an illusion of wealth around the Bachelor that’s not real. Like, I don’t think Nick has a job other than reality television, but the dates that he’s taking these women on are super elaborate, and it’s not like he’s – he’s not paying for it, he’s not setting it up, he’s not thinking of it. Someone else is doing all of that, but it does create this illusion around him of, like, a really opulent idea of romance, and I can understand where there that would skew your perspective. Like, if I went on a date with a guy and we took a helicopter to a private yacht, I’d probably feel slightly different about that date than if we went to Denny’s!
Sarah: So there’s basically a huge amount of wealth surrounding the development of the relationship, but that wealth isn’t actually there.
Bea or Leah and Elyse: Right.
Bea: But there’s also a, everybody talks about how they just want to be normal?
Leah: Yeah.
Sarah: I’m not buying that.
Leah: Somebody gets a normal date where they go grocery shopping, and they’re like, oh, but the other girl got to, like, dress up in a Cinderella outfit!
Bea: Yeah, they frequently reference grocery shopping, and it’s like, what do you guys think you do in a grocery store?
[Laughter]
Bea: Like, it’s not, I, I don’t know. It’s, it’s a weird thing. I think a lot of people who go on the show – okay, so here’s the truth: to go on this show, you have to have a job that you can take a six-week leave from.
Elyse: Mm-hmm.
Sarah: Yep.
Bea: So it’s not like it’s a bunch of people who take their careers super seriously. Now clearly there are, there are exceptions to that rule. Rachel is a lawyer, and by all accounts after she was kicked off, went back to Dal-, Dallas? She from Dallas?
Leah: I think so.
Bea: Went back to Dallas and returned to her practice. So, Andi Dorfman, on the other hand, was a lawyer, didn’t want to go back to being a lawyer, and now lives in New York, wrote a book, and is kind of like a Gal About Town. So sometimes The Bachelor can maybe take away your career ambitions. But, yeah, there’s not a ton of people who have a ton of money, unless they have it from their family?
Elyse: Right.
Bea: And it’s not a huge, like, stereotype to say.
Leah: I don’t know.
Bea: But, yeah, there’s not a lot of wealth, actually, and Nick has not had a real job for –
Leah: Right, six years?! In the first season he appeared on, I think he was billed as a software salesman or something?
Sarah: [Laughs]
Elyse: Right.
Sarah: So what do they get paid for this show? What does the show compensate them for their appearances? Do they get paid? Is it like this, is it like Survivor, where you get a certain amount of money based on how long you last?
Leah: I think everybody gets paid, like, a stipend kind of thing?
Sarah: Mm-hmm.
Bea: I think they’re given a lot of free shit, but I don’t know if they –
Leah: I think they have to pay them at least a little bit.
Bea: That’s interesting.
Leah: I don’t know for sure. Do you know, Elyse?
Elyse: I, I have no idea. I mean, I would imagine it’s probably – like, I know on Dancing with the Stars and other reality shows, the more you get paid, or that you get paid more for the further along you get. It’s kind of a sliding scale, which makes sense. Wasn’t there a season, too, where there was some scandal – I can’t remember if was The Bachelor – where one of the women and one of the producers, like, hooked up, and –
Bea: Oh, my gosh!
Leah: It’s the greatest video of all time!
Bea: You must link to this. It is so funny.
Leah: I’ll find the YouTube clip and send it to you, ‘cause we watch it, I, we showed it – we watch old clips sometimes during the commercial breaks? It was actually on Bachelor in Paradise, and they did a reenactment of what happened, and it so amazing I will now describe it for you.
Bea: Yes, please.
Leah: So I don’t remember any of these people’s names. The girl, like, I think voluntarily left Bachelor in Paradise and was, like, super weird. She was, like –
Bea: She was very squirrelly. She was like, I don’t think I want to be here, da-da-da-da-da –
Leah: Right.
Bea: – I’m leaving.
Leah: She didn’t come right out and say it, so then she goes back to the hotel where they stay at before they, like, get on a plane to go – ‘cause this is in Mexico – so they do a reenactment of a female producer knocking on her door, and she sticks her head out, and then you just hear a crash, and the male producer who she’s been shacking up with has jumped off her balcony and broken both of his –
[Laughter]
Leah: – and then they go to his hospital room. He’s lying there, he has two broken legs –
Bea: And he’s so high on pain meds, they’re like, bro, you made a mistake, and he’s like, bleh-bleh-bleh-bleh.
Leah: It’s so amazing!
Elyse: [Laughs] I can’t breathe!
Bea: And then the producers were literally crying laughing.
Leah: Oh, yeah, the one girl, the girl who, the producer who knocked on the door is, like, recounting this story –
Bea: They’re like, tell us what happened, what just happened? And she can’t stop, she’s crying laughing. She can’t stop.
Leah: So, it’s so funny!
Bea: He was, like, a friend of theirs, like, did this fucking stupid thing and jumped off a Goddamn balcony and broke both his legs!
[Laughter]
Leah: It’s so amazing! [Laughs]
Elyse: Oh, God! That’s –
Bea or Leah: I will –
Elyse: – that’s worth watching a show for, right there.
Leah: It is so freaking hilarious. It’s one of the funniest things to ever happen on a Bachelor series. Other than the raccoon that they edited –
Bea: Yeah, we’ll find the raccoon clip, too. [Laughs]
Leah: Yeah.
Sarah: So, wait, in Bachelor in Paradise, are they already paired up and they just have to survive as a couple?
Leah: No, no, no –
Sarah: Oh.
Leah: – it’s just, like, they’re heavily hinted.
Bea: Right, but that is how Paradise works? You get to stay in this free Mexican villa if you have a partner of the opposite sex. So, it, that’s, they, like, bring new people in and out, and if you haven’t paired up with somebody, then your free vacation ends.
Leah: But the bartender in Paradise –
Bea: Oh, my God.
Leah: – like, plays, like, a very large role, because he’s, like, their confessor and therapist? They all, like, go to him to talk, and he just, like, stares at them and is like, oh, my God –
Bea: Yeah.
Leah: – get a life. That’s good. They also edit them talking to animals. Like, they just have a lot more fun on Paradise.
Bea: And also it moves a lot faster. The dates are, like, two minutes long, ‘cause they know nobody cares.
Leah: Yeah. So that’s good.
Bea: So at the end of last season, four couples became engaged.
Sarah: Whoa. That’s a lot.
Leah: A lot, two of which have broken up and two of which are still together? Who was the fourth one? The –
Bea: Oh, one couple got tattoos of each other’s names, and then they broke up.
Sarah: Oh, no!
Elyse: Oh, that’s like the kiss of death.
Leah: Yeah.
Bea: Okay, so the thing is that their couple name together was Grace, which is, like, a real word, so they just have Grace on their arms.
Somebody: [Snorts]
Elyse: Well, okay, that’s less awful than I –
Bea: It’s, it’s stupid. Like, we all know what you were doing. You’re dumb.
[Laughter]
Leah: We really didn’t like them.
Bea: Okay. Then there were Amanda and fucking Josh, which, to get into Amanda and Josh, you have to know, like, a lot of Bachelor back story, so I won’t really get into it, but she has two kids, and they, they are adorable, and she dresses them like tiny boho supermodels, which is a little weird, but whatever, you do you, girl. But I did not approve of her pairing with Josh at all.
Leah: No, ‘cause he’s kind of like a major douchewad, and –
Bea: And there are accusations that he is not above board and maybe abused Andi, but – not physically, but emotionally abused Andi Dorfman.
Leah: And Carly and the erectile dysfunction doctor are supposedly still together. [Laughs]
Bea: Yeah, and he has kids too!
Leah: But she had tried, like, six times, so it was good that she got somebody, even if he is an erectile dysfunction doctor.
Bea: Yeah. You know, you do you. And then –
Bea and Leah: Who was the last one?
Leah: I can’t remember.
Bea: It’s a lot to remember.
Leah: We can’t, we can’t get ‘em all.
Bea: No. But, so, like, that’s ridiculous, you know? Four couples getting engaged at the end is rid-, is a ridiculous thing to happen.
Sarah: Well, eventually you’re going to sober up, and it’s not going to be warm, and you’re not going to be on vacation, and that seems like it could be a problem.
Leah: Bachelor in Paradise is even shorter than regular Bachelor! I think they’re there for, like, a month.
Bea: Yeah. But you do get a lot more alone time. You, you can, you could spend, like, every second together. But still, like, what, you’re not ready to be engaged after that; that’s ridiculous.
Leah: Success story.
Bea: If you’re a success story, they’re going to bring you back for reunion shows, and you’re going to get better endorsement deals on Instagram, and there’s a whole economy around the Bachelor Family group which we cannot ignore. [Laughs]
Elyse: Right, yeah. I mean, I think a lot of these people have gone on to other things, like whether it’s Dancing with the Stars or some kind of promotion or, I mean, or Us Weekly is really short on shit to write about this week, so they’re going to check back in with so-and-so.
Leah: Recently a lot of the women have become lifestyle bloggers.
Bea: Yeah, they, and then they start ars-, you know, they use links to, affiliate links to sell their clothes. Like, it’s just –
Leah: Catherine Lowe had done one of the best jobs, in which she was a graphic designer –
Bea: Yeah.
Leah: – before the show, and now she has her own line of stationery which is actually really cute?
Sarah: It is, it is so interesting to me, because I’m, I, like I said, I’m not a reality show person, and it, it’s not a thing that interests me, but listening to people who are super enthusiastic and into all the different layers of what you’re, what story you’re being told is fascinating!
Elyse: I think one of the things that, you know, we touched on, like in terms of they’re not actually spending a lot of time together? You know, that plays into a lot of romance tropes, like when you think about actual courtships that would have happened in the Regency. I mean, you don’t spend any time alone together –
Sarah: Yep!
Elyse: – until after you are married. But it’s the same thing with, with fairytales. Like, I went to see Beauty and the Beast yesterday, and Cinderella. It’s, it’s, they go through this elaborate courtship ritual, but they don’t actually spend any time alone together until after the Happily Ever After.
Leah: How was Beauty and the Beast?
Elyse: Oh, my God. It was, it’s not perfect, and I will acknowledge that, but it hit me right in my nostalgia feels, and I loved everything about it, and I went with my eight-year-old niece, and when Gaston dies at the end – everyone knows he dies – she goes, eh, he deserved it.
[Laughter]
Sarah: I like her.
Elyse: They actually attempted to answer some questions in this version that the first version was like, as an adult you’re like, how did everyone suddenly forget we had a monarchy? Like, how did that happen? Right?
Sarah: I want to know, see, the, the fundamental problem with Beauty and the Beast, and I know you guys have to go in a minute, is that, you know, if, if, if the timeline as stated in the intro is correct, then a strange woman came to an eleven-year-old boy’s house, and he, he wouldn’t let her in, which is the right decision, and as a result, she curses him and everyone who works in the house with him – where the hell his parents are, I have no idea – and they are stuck because of a decision he made, and they’re all taking care of him, and nobody says, hold on, you told a strange woman in the middle of the night as an eleven-year-old boy, presumably home by yourself, not to come in your house. That’s the right call!
Elyse: In this version, he’s a lot older, so I’m guessing he’s in his twenties, and they also make a big point of the fact that he’s a shitbag, and, like, he overtaxes his people, and all he cares about is having all of these fancy things in his castle and pretty people to surround him, and he doesn’t give a shit about anyone else, so he is, he’s older when it happens, and there’s also more context around him just kind of being an awful human being in general.
Sarah: That makes sense. All right –
Elyse: Right.
Sarah: – is there anything else that you guys want to add to this episode? I’m now tempted to call it He’s Like Leftover Meatloaf.
Bea: Yeah, I like that.
Elyse: Yeah!
Leah: I think that’s a great title.
Sarah: Leftover Meatloaf: Elyse, Leah, and Bea Talk About The Bachelor.
Elyse: I would like to have a reality show where someone has to live with Nick for, like, three months, and –
[Laughter]
Elyse: Or, like, a group of women do, and you win by getting voted off. Like, the winner, like, the better you’re doing, the sooner you get to leave.
Bea: That’s amazing.
Leah: The, the, the quicker you get out of there.
Sarah: All right, thank you guys so much for doing this. I know you have to go ans-, open your store and be awesome.
Bea: We, we do have to open our store and put it back together, because about three hundred people came by yesterday.
Sarah: Was yesterday the panel discussion?
Bea: It was –
Leah: No, that’s on Thursday.
Bea: Oh, my God.
Leah: Today, today is Sunday, March 19th. Yesterday was an event with Kristen Ashley and Kylie Scott and Joanna Wylde –
Sarah: Oh, that’s only a few hundred people.
Leah: They were all fabulous and wonderful, but there were four million people, and we came home and collapsed into our beds.
Bea: [Yawns]
Leah: Yes, Thursday – sorry, there’s a siren going by – Thursday is that awesome panel discussion. I’m so excited for that.
Sarah: I would not be able to keep my cool in front of the Fug Girls; I would lose it.
Bea: Yeah.
Leah: I’m so excited to meet them!
Bea: Oh, my God.
Leah: Bea’s going to freak out.
Bea: Imma lose it.
Leah: I’m very excited.
Sarah: I’m, I would lose my shit. Well, thank you guys so much for talking about The Bachelor. I –
Bea: It’s our –
Leah: Thanks for having us!
Bea: – delight that this is, like, a part of our job.
Leah: Yeah!
[Laughter]
Sarah: I know, right? Like, I, I have to, I have to go on and talk about The Bachelor. So, would you guys be open to doing future conversations about future, future franchise appearances?
Bea: Oh, okay, that stuff, whenever!
Leah: Um, yes! Yes, we would be.
Bea: With high hopes for Rachel’s season, so, you know.
Sarah: Oh, dude.
Bea: We’ll talk at the end of that and see how it went.
[music]
Sarah: And that is all for this episode. I want to thank Elyse and Leah and Bea and of course Mr. Fitzwilliam Waffles for hanging out and talking about The Bachelor. I hope that you enjoyed this as much as I did. I’m hoping that after the next season of The Bachelorette we can have them back together to talk about how that went, in their opinion. And I’m still probably not a reality television person, even though I found their conversation so interesting.
I would like to thank Tracy Ewens for sponsoring this episode, and I would like to tell you about her book Exposure, which you should totally know about. It comes out on March 28th, 2017, and because Tracy knows you like romance, she would like you to know that her latest contemporary has the following strains of excellent romance reader catnip: first, a world-traveling wildlife photographer heroine, Meg, who has recently moved back to San Francisco because she wants a life with more stability and she wants to see her family more than once a year and do crazy things like own her own toaster and consistently use a full-size tube of toothpaste. Part two: a famous hero with secrets. Westin is a famous actor known for blockbuster movies in which he drives exceedingly fast cars, but he would kind of like his fifteen minutes of fame to be over. He misses his privacy, and in real life he’s a terrible driver. And part three: a fake relationship – and I know you just perked up, because yay, fake relationship! After a very simple kiss on the cheek, a media frenzy erupts around them, and when they’re thrown together in public, Meg gets to know the real person behind all the photographs, and West begins to wonder how he can live his real life without her in it. Love is never easy when it seems like the world is watching. You can find out what happens by preordering Exposure wherever eBooks are sold, and big thanks to author Tracy Ewens for sponsoring this episode!
The very funky music you are listening to, which I am seriously enjoying as I produce this episode, is brought to you by Sassy Outwater. You can find her on Twitter @SassyOutwater. This is Caravan Palace from their two-album set, which includes both Caravan Palace and Panic. This track is called “Je m’amuse,” which means I’m having a good time, I think is what that means. Someone who speaks better French than me is probably like, no, that’s not what it means! You can find this album, both albums, in one convenient package on Amazon and iTunes, and you can find Caravan Palace on Facebook and on their website, caravanpalace.com.
I will have links to The Ripped Bodice and Fitzwilliam Waffles’ Instagram, which you should totally take a look at, as well as different and, different links that we mention during the episode, especially the Santa Fe animal shelter’s Dog Bachelor program on YouTube? You know I’m linking to that, right? So if you would like to find additional information, you can come find the podcast at smartbitchestrashybooks.com/podcast or at iTunes.com/DBSA.
And if you are enjoying the podcast, I would like to ask that you have a look at our podcast Patreon at patreon.com/SmartBitches, but if that is not a thing that you can do, totally cool! If you tell a person that you like the show and you recommend it to someone else, you leave a review, you subscribe on whatever podcast listening app you use, those are enormously helpful, so thank you very, very much!
On behalf of Bea and Leah and Fitzwilliam and Elyse and myself and all of the animals here trying to help me edit this episode, we wish you the very best of reading. Have a great weekend!
[very funky music]
This podcast transcript was handcrafted with meticulous skill by Garlic Knitter. Many thanks.
Okay, I’m super exhausted rn but you have Burning Love under your links so…caffeine and podcast it is!
I was super hard to convince, huh?
I love the whole Bachelor treatment here at SBTB. Have not watched one second of this season’s show, have seen Nick for a minute on DWTS (he was mildly entertaining despite clearly being a tool) but based on the commentary I have to postulate the he is one of those guys who wants a mother he can fuck.
I mean seriously. There are a lot of them. They want a woman who will take care of their every need and make all the sacrifices and make sure the Prince is doing what he needs to do (gods forbid he should remember anything himself), with a degree of bossiness which this kind of guy is turned on by, but who is also super good-looking and willing to drop trou on a moment’s notice. Basically a sitcom wife, is what they want.
I hate guys like that.
Haven’t watched the Bachelor, but I did watch UnReal (binge watched season 1&2 on amazon). It was a tad on the soapy side, but very entertaining! Thought season one was better than season two though.
I’m off to watch the dog bachelor! 🙂
I love Dancing with the Stars, and I’m looking forward to Nick going home. I think it might take three or four weeks, though.
My husband, mother-in-law, Mom, and I all saw Beauty and the Beast last weekend (Elyse talks about it towards the end of podcast) and we thought it was really really good. The actor that was cast as Gaston nailed it. And as Elyse mentions in the podcast, a lot of the plot points that were unclear or not explained in the original animated version are explained here and those were much appreciated!
Well, crap. Now I’m curious. I want to dive into old Bachelor seasons, but I can’t figure out where to watch them online. Any leads?
@Carolyn this season is on ABC.com and Hulu. I don’t think old seasons are online yet
@Katie C. & Elyse. Not sure I approve of the elimination of the predatory overtones given off by the fairy sorceress. They were present in the early French version written by Villeneuve – more than present, very strong, more like text than subtext. (I was alerted to this by a mention on TV Tropes http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/WifeHusbandry. (Not a 100% accurate summary.))
Basically, the much older fairy lady served as tutor to the young prince, and then expected him to marry her when he reached maturity. I dunno where his dad was (sorry; only so much facsimile 18th century French I can read on GoogleBooks at a stretch), but his mum was there when the fairy sprung the marriage demand on them and said “hell no!” So the fairy gave them hell.
I understand that the female pedophile part is a bit hardcore, but the blame-shifting to the child/adolescent (making him beauty-fixated, and maybe ageist, too) in the modern versions bothers me. Even considering they tone it down from a teacher grooming a student for sexual abuse to a ‘stranger danger’ situation… Door-knocking is still part of predators’ repertoire, a way of ‘compliance checking’ potential victims, with much less excuse than back when it was miles to the nearest village. (Cf: recent episodes of Real Crime Profile. Btw thank you Elyse for the recommendation. Wanted a follow-up to Gavin de Becker.)
@Carolyn The first seasons of The Bachelor and The Bachelorette are available on ABC.com. I’d recommend comparing the first season of Bachelor with the most recent season. You can really see how far the show has come in respect to growing into itself and its premise. Back when the show first aired, it’s clear that the no one had any idea how it would work and the women were dealing with a lot of public criticism for going on a tv show to find love. Plus, the first Bachelor was a total clueless jerk so it’s fun to yell at the tv during his season. The show as it exists now is far from perfect but it has figured out a few things about itself.
I would highly recommend watching the first season of The Bachelorette because Trista, the lead, is amazing. She’s really frank when discussing sex and what she wants from her life and her partner. Plus, she’s still happily married to the guy she picked at the end and I think it’s pretty clear how they managed to stay so happy after watching the beginning of their relationship on the show. They’re so cute together!
Thanks for the podcast, ladies! I listen to another Bachelor podcast regularly but I really enjoy hearing y’all explore the show through the perspective of romance and storytelling.
I have to say that the story about the Bachelor crew member sleeping with a contestant had me dying of laughter. I decided to investigate the situation as I don’t watch the show and know none of the characters. However I came across this little gem, and my apologies if this was brought up already, but the crew member’s name that broke both of his legs is Ryan PUTZ. You’re welcome.