The Bachelor creator on casting Colton Underwood over Blake, Jason
Related The Bachelor video – Check out some more of our first thoughts on Colton’s casting below! Meanwhile, be sure to subscribe to CarterMatt on YouTube for some other insight.
We don’t want to claim that Fleiss is publicity-shy, mostly in that he is fairly-active on social media. Yet, he doesn’t do too many interviews on the subject of The Bachelor. He did one this week, though, with Entertainment Weekly, making it clear as to why Colton was chosen over Blake and Jason, two other contenders who were a part of this past season with Becca Kufrin:
All the guys we could have gone with, they all have their pluses and minuses, you know? It’s always a very difficult choice. And people get angry no matter who we choose. The only person that we ever chose who didn’t seem to piss people off was Juan Pablo! It was like 100 percent approval for the choice of Juan Pablo. So it’s a hard thing to figure.
We like this guy. He’s interesting, he’s certainly hunky, he looks the part, he’s an all-American kid, a football player. The virginity thing is interesting. And we think that just the potential of [Colton losing his virginity] creates added stakes for this season. When we sat with all the guys that we were considering, Colton just seemed like a star. When you’re in the room with him, you’re like, that’s a big personality, a big presence. He just won us over. And he has grown from the time he was on Bachelorette. I think the Bachelor in Paradise experience did add to his maturity.
While we’re not one to agree necessarily with the majority of the stuff Fleiss says, at the same time we do think that there’s a certain degree of honesty to this. Juan Pablo was universally loved before he was chosen to be the lead, and we do also agree with another sentiment he gives in this interview: Openly campaigning to be the Bachelor (as both Jason and Blake did) isn’t necessarily a good thing. We think they both could’ve been fine, but really what matters most is what happens during the season as opposed to after the fact. Do you really need to like the Bachelor to enjoy the season? We also wonder about that given that Arie Luyendyk Jr. delivered one of the (seriously) most-dramatic moments in Bachelor History at the end of his season. We probably were in the Jason camp preseason, but it’s really more about the journey with these shows than the end result.
What do you think about Colton being the lead of The Bachelor, and does it make you any more or less excited to watch? Be sure to share right now in the attached comments. (Photo: ABC.)