There’s a moment from the first season of “The Golden Bachelor” that I can’t get out of my head.
In episode five, 72-year-old “Bachelor” Gerry Turner must cull the group of women vying for his heart from six to three. He stands in front of them, eyes welling with tears, and ultimately gifts the final rose of the night to the petite, 70-year-old brunette Theresa Nist.
It’s the reaction of Leslie Fhima, however, the 64-year-old former professional dancer who will also vie for Turner’s heart in Thursday night’s season finale, that stuck with me. When Fhima realizes that her friend Ellen Goltzer is being eliminated, she slides closer to Ellen and gently leans her head on the other woman’s shoulder. The camera immediately pans away, following Nist as she weepily accepts Turner’s rose, but it’s that moment of tenderness between Fhima and Goltzer that burrowed its way into my heart.
It’s the reaction of Leslie Fhima, however, the 64-year-old former professional dancer who will also vie for Turner’s heart in Thursday night’s season finale, that stuck with me.
Anyone who watches reality television is familiar with the trope that cast members on competition shows — even if that competition is for love — “aren’t there to make friends.” But the women of “The Golden Bachelor” seemed there for love and friendship. And those of us who tuned in week after week were there to watch them search — for companionship, for friendship, for the right to be seen and heard and valued — whether or not they ended up with Turner, a man whose on-screen persona can best be described as an AI-generated, Sensitive Midwesterner Ken doll.
Watching “The Golden Bachelor” has been an experience rife with joy. Where past seasons of “The Bachelor” have leaned into conflict and reduced the women to unflattering, flattening tropes, “Golden” flips the script and embraces complexity.
The most heated the drama gets is when Kathy Swarts tells Nist to…
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