Chris Harrison Exits ‘Bachelor’ Franchise; Rose Withers On 19-Year Run As Host After Racism Controversy
Just hours after The Bachelorette's 17th season began, longtime host Chris Harrison has left the romance franchise forever.
In front of The Bachelor and all its lucrative ABC spinoffs produced by Mike Fleiss since 2002, Harrison will receive his own rose in the form of a mid-range eight-figure payout and promise to keep his mouth shut, I hear. When the agreement is made public later today, general promises are expected to be exchanged for public consumption, but there is certainly no romance in the air behind the scenes.
While whispers over Harrison's permanent breakup with the Bachelorverse revealed last week that Fleece pal David Spade and others would be hosting the next season of Bachelor in Paradise this summer, the form of the final split was uncertain as of this morning. Penciling as to his event horizon at the Bachelorette premiere, Harrison's reps have been in increasingly intense conversations over the past few days with WBTV and to a lesser extent with Disney-owned ABC.
After that last night's deadline with resolving the money issue came and passed, it was the legal diversion that persisted.
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Another flurry between parties and Bachelor broadcaster ABC on Monday night followed a confidential settlement with franchise producers and distributor Warner Horizon. In a persuasive undercurrent, so to speak, Harrison's attorney Brian Friedman pledged to free Shiva of lawsuits uncovering a swath of The Bachelor's alleged dirty laundry, as long as his Gersh-raped client was financially don't feel love.
When contacted by Deadline, representatives for neither Harrison, WBTV nor ABC returned a request for comment on the settlement. We will update when we hear from them.
Harrison was spun off from the franchise earlier this year, offering a pass and "compassion" in an interview to Bachelor contestant Rachel Kirkconnell in 2018 photos from an Old South slave plantation-themed fraternity. The show appeared in front of a Season 25 contestant who participated in the formal. As the interviews culminated and Kirkconnell's racist prickly party grew increasingly loud, a loud nudge and apologetic Harrison announced around Valentine's Day that he would be "stepping aside" from the first season of The Bachelor with a black man at the core. Will happen.
Highlighting the pitfalls of pre-recording in this context, Bachelor Matt James actually handed the final rose to Kirkconnell on the March 15 season 25 finale with the rare lack of proposal. However, as soon as the pictures of the antebellum South became public after the completion of Bachelor production, the same night James made it clear on the Emmanuel Ecko-hosted After the Rose special that he had cut things off with Kirkconnell. The couple later said that they were trying to reconcile.
Now Harrison and The Bachelor are franchise Splitsville. What has been left unresolved by the settlement is how quickly and how quickly Fleas, WB and ABC will be able to stabilize the franchise.