‘The Bachelor’ Senior Citizen Spinoff Is Still Happening at ABC
While ABC’s focus may be The Bachelorette (set for the fall) and The Bachelor (January 2021), the powers that be in the franchise haven’t forgotten about that previously announced senior citizen spinoff.
In February, there was a casting call for “seniors looking for love,” specifically, “active and outgoing single men and women age 65 and up” who “are ready for a committed relationship.” Like everything else, that was put on hold due to the coronavirus pandemic. However, it will likely still happen, probably in the 2021-2022 season, Variety reports.
ABC is currently prioritizing the next seasons of The Bachelorette (with Clare Crawley) and The Bachelor (with Matt James), followed by Bachelor in Paradise, which was not able to air this summer. “That will have been off for a year,” Rob Mills, ABC’s top unscripted executive, said. While the network does want to do the senior citizen spinoff (and those behind the series feel positive about the response to casting calls so far), “we want to do it right, do it safely and not at the expense of the other Bachelor cycles,” Mills explained.
But it is still very much in the works, especially given that it would be different from the other shows in the franchise because of where the singles are in their lives. These people have “lived their lives, they’ve raised their kids, some have been widowed or divorced and maybe some have never been in love,” Mills said. (Hometown dates would include meeting the kids, not the parents.) “We thought that would be an interesting dynamic through the Bachelor prism.”
It’s possible that this spinoff could be handled the same way as the upcoming season of The Bachelorette, with cast and crew quarantined in an isolated location and following safety guidelines, especially since seniors are considered high-risk. But considering when it would air, “we’re all hoping the world has returned to some sort of normalcy by then,” Mills said.
