“A whole cast still to come”: 10 defends The Bachelors casting
10 boss Beverley McGarvey is confident people will see diversity across its revamped Bachelor series when all is revealed.
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EXCLUSIVE:
10 has defended its casting of three male leads in a revamped Bachelor series after some commentary that criticised a lack of diversity.
Former Bachelor franchise participants including Angie Kent and Abbie Chatfield were amongst those who took to social media to question the ethnic make-up of the three Anglo Bachelors, Felix Von Hofe, Thomas Malucelli and Jed McIntosh.
Paramount also has a strict “no diversity, no commission” rule across its productions -but there is a wider interpretation of this which extends to cast and crew as a whole.
Executive Vice President and Chief Content Officer, Paramount Australia and New Zealand, Beverley McGarvey told TV Tonight, “Diversity looks at many things, and even to cast the way that it’s been cast, those guys don’t necessarily all print like your typical Bachelor of years gone by. There’s a whole significant portion of that cast still to come, which will make people probably slightly rethink their position.
“It’s about cast and crew in representation and we do feel that it matters, and we’ve demonstrated that clearly with all of our casting choices.”
Filming has just commenced in Queensland, in a revamped series which expands on cast size and format. The announcement of the three male leads was to reset the show with its audience.
“This year, we were trying to do something different with Bachelor, even just in terms of the age range, which allows us to cast different types of women as well.
“We’re just going to stay quiet on that and then once people see the entire cast, then they will see that the entire cast is very representative of the Australian population.”
McGarvey also explains that dating shows sometimes attract different applicants from community groups than cooking and talent shows.
“There are particular nationalities and people of cultural backgrounds who potentially didn’t want to find their husband on TV,” she suggests.
“It’s not like MasterChef or Survivor when you open up casting and get a broad range of Australians applying. There are certain shows when you open up casting, you get a potential particular segment of the population. So you have to work that bit harder, which we all should do… which we have been doing.”
She adds, “No matter what you do, you definitely get feedback!”
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- Tagged with The Bachelor, The Bachelors
7 Responses
Whether they have skin colour diversity or LGBTQ+ diversity. It still won’t really be diverse to me until they actually have an overweight person – especially a female- on the show! Two thirds of the population are overweight yet never on TV dating shows it seems.
Sure, Jan. A lot of people made up their mind last week and won’t tune this. I have a feeling this is the last Bachelor series.
A lot of people think diversity equals skin tone and I think that’s not always correct. One surname is German heritage and another is Italian heritage. The other surname is Scottish or Irish. Are they as underrepresented as other heritages or cultural backgrounds at the forefront of commercial free-to-air in Australia? Probably not.
There’s no doubting that there will be diversity, given the diversity policy. Though should it be across the board or with the marketing photography including the whole cast.
Bev. If you’re getting more diverse applicants for a show like Survivor then why was the last cast still majority caucasian?
Something is not adding up.
Other Paramount productions in the US have a mandated 50/50 casting split.
It’s time Paramount Australia followed this rule.
It was like there was a list of all the wrong things you could say and she’s said all of them..
“..probably slightly rethink…” (ie. They will not change their minds or opinions).
“…we’ve demonstrated that with all of our casting choices.” (Three white, straight, males. Sure).
“You get a particular segment of the population…” (I find this hard to believe they don’t have a range of diverse backgrounds here).
The story indicates the cast (and crew) as a whole is more representative, hence “all” in the casting choices.
It’s about representation on screen though and even if the dating pool shows some diversity (beyond age) it leaves the question why doesn’t that extend to it’s leads.