Colton Underwood, best known for starring in dating shows like The Bachelorette and Bachelor in Paradise, and subsequently leading his own season of The Bachelor, did an interview on the Boyfriend Material podcast hosted by Harry Jowsey — who's also known for competing on dating shows like Too Hot to Handle, Match Me If You Can, and Perfect Match.
During the episode, Underwood — who came out as gay after The Bachelor — chatted with Jowsey about the possibility of a "gay season" of The Bachelor, which has been an ongoing topic of discussion within the Bachelor Nation fandom.
It all started when Jowsey shared the story of meeting the leading men of the Australian version of The Bachelor. "I remember when I went back to Australia, I met the Bachelors, and they had three Bachelors. (…) When I saw there were three, I was like, 'What is going on here?'"
This prompted Underwood to comment on the ongoing discussions surrounding a "gay Bachelor" season. He explained:
"Everybody keeps saying, 'Will The Bachelor ever do a gay Bachelor?' And my response is like… I think it's lazy for people to always put that on The Bachelor franchise, but I do think there's a version in which, if we had three Bachelors at the same time, you can represent [the LGBTQ+] community as a whole."
"It's hard to represent the gay community with one singular person," Underwood continued. "Everybody's so picky, and they have types, and our community is so diverse… and it's like, one person — no matter who you pick — are going to roll their eyes. So I think having three [leads] could be the solution to avoiding that and I think it makes for a dramatic and messy season."
Jowsey then asked about the "structure" of this format, and Underwood was eager to share all the details.
"I would split them up into pods, so they'd represent… I thought about this, yeah," Underwood joked. Jowsey asked Underwood to keep pitching the idea, but Underwood argued that producers would "just steal it and put it on air and not credit me. I already know how this goes, I've been burned by it before. They have my cell phone number and my agent's number. We have the format figured out, that's all I'll say."
Underwood then commented on the fact that he'd be open to hosting this gay season of The Bachelor if producers were interested in having him. He also brought up Gabby Windey as a potential host, as she's another Bachelor alum who came out after leading her own season.
(L-R) Tayshia Adams; Rachel Recchia and Gabby Windey; Kaitlyn Bristowe
ABC
Yes! The idea of having more than one lead for a season of The Bachelor season isn't actually that original — even if we're sticking with the flagship U.S. franchise.
The first (and, shockingly, not even the most chaotic) time this happened was The Bachelorette season 11, which started with two potential leading women for the series. Both Kaitlyn Bristowe and Britt Nilsson were seen at the premiere meeting their potential suitors.
By the end of the night, male contestants voted for which woman they'd like to lead the rest of the season. Kaitlyn won the popular vote, which meant that Britt got to be The Bachelorette for one night.
Season 16 of The Bachelorette started with Clare Crawley as the lead. By episode 3, Clare simply determined that she had already fallen in love with a contestant and should leave the show with him… instead of performing her duties like every single other lead in the franchise had done, which was to go through with the entire process and make a final decision at the finale.
Clare's CHAOTIC quitting prompted producers to re-cast the lead of The Bachelorette season 16 with Tayshia Adams. This meant that every single guy who came to that season to pursue Clare was now tasked to decide whether to leave the show or to stick it out… if they managed to form a connection with Tayshia, starting from zero, being halfway through the entire season.
Gabby Windey and Rachel Recchia were the first actual co-leads of an entire season of The Bachelorette. Given the messy voting system for season 11 and last-minute replacement format of season 16, producers announced right away that season 19 was a legitimate chance for both of those women to lead the entire time — no switch-ups or voting involved.
Fun fact: after going through this Bachelorette journey, Gabby Windey came out and announced that she was dating a woman as of August 2023.
The cast of 'Bachelor in Paradise' season 8.
ABC
Casual viewers of reality TV might not be familiar with Bachelor in Paradise, which puts a "free-for-all" spin on dating shows and works in a similar way as Love Island. There are no leads in these seasons: just groups of men and groups of women who can bond, make connections, and couple up with their choice of a love interest.
This has become a more common structure for modern dating shows, such as Netflix's Too Hot to Handle, which marked Jowsey's reality TV debut, and the streamer's hit series Love Is Blind.
(L-R) '12 Dates of Christmas' season 1; 'FBoy Island'; '12 Dates of Christmas' season 2
HBO Max; The CW
Yes, there have been a few, actually!
The streaming service once called HBO Max (now just Max) had two seasons of a dating competition series called 12 Dates of Christmas. The concept was pretty radical at the time, but also rather interesting and inclusive.
12 Dates of Christmas season 1 had a gay man (Garrett Marcantel), a straight woman (Faith Fernandez), and a straight man (Chad Savage) as the three leads of the season. This meant that the group of contestants who entered the competition were all pursuing for one specific lead based on their preferences.
The second season of 12 Dates of Christmas was even cheerer and queerer as featured three leads — two of which were gay! Markelle Smith (a gay man), Amanda Grace Jenkins (a lesbian woman), and Danny Escalante (a straight man) were the three leading people of the season, once again pushing for more diversity in terms of sexual orientation, race, and "unconventional pairings" in the eyes of mainstream media.
Hosted by Nikki Glaser, FBoy Island has run for three seasons so far — each featuring three women who explored a pool of male contestants made up of "nice guys" and "fboys."
Even though some people on the show did identify as more than just straight, this was a pretty straight-fronting series about pairing up men and women. Nonetheless, it was another example of a dating show with three leading people instead of just one.
(L-R) The Boyfriend; The Ultimatum Queer Love; I Kissed a BoyNetflix; BBC ThreeTruth be told, we are living through a pretty good moment in LGBTQ+ representation when it comes to dating shows.
From Netflix's The Boyfriend and The Ultimatum: Queer Love to the BBC's I Kissed a Boy and I Kissed a Girl to other shows like For the Love of DILFs, Couple to Throuple, and Sparks Camp, there's more queer and trans representation in the dating show genre than ever before — and we'd like to make even more progress moving forward!
In fact, we've got a full list of LGBTQ+ dating shows and where to watch them, so check that out and start adding these projects to your queue!
