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| TV Reviews | |
not worth the weight New Fox show is from the creator of the 'Bachelor' Jul 28, 2009
In the series, premiering on Fox tonight at 9 p.m., a 330-pound, 26-year-old real estate investor named Luke Conley will choose a potential life partner from among 20 overweight single women. The echoes of the original reality dating show are blatant. Watching “More to Love” is like watching “The Bachelor” with your TV picture set to widescreen. Fortunately, executive producer Mike Fleiss needn’t fear being sued for plagiarism, since he’s also the executive producer of “The Bachelor.” (Probably not coincidentally, the current season of “The Bachelorette” is ending the day before “More to Love” premieres.) Just as in Fleiss’ previous franchise, the bachelor meets his potential mates in front of an ostentatious Los Angeles mansion as they exit one by one from a parked limousine in their long dresses. The women spend the rest of the premiere episode vying for his attention at a cocktail party near the obligatory swimming pool. In place of the usual “Bachelor” rose ceremony, Luke reduces the field at the end of the premiere by offering 15 of the women a “promise ring.” (Chris Harrison’s host role is taken by the well-known plus-size model Emme.) As in “The Bachelor,” the women are instantly enamored of their potential mate. This can seem implausible on “The Bachelor,” but on “More to Love” there’s a reason. In interview segments, many of the women confess they have never had a long-term relationship; some have never even dated. We repeatedly hear them saying that they see this show as their last chance. Luke does come off as appealing, but this may be because of the same cultural biases that consider an overweight man more attractive than an overweight woman. (For example, it’s standard operating procedure for TV producers to cast a babe like Leah Remini as the wife of a husky man like Kevin James.) Luke also says all the right things. As the dolled-up women approach him, he compliments each one on her looks, dress or beautiful eyes. Addressing the women as a group, he tells them that he hopes to learn what they’re like on the inside, but first he says, “I want you all to know that I think you’re all gorgeous on the outside.” He confides to the camera that he’s been rejected in the past because of his weight, but none of his stories come close to the women’s sad tales. They talk of being ignored while men hit on their skinny friends, of never being asked out on a second date, of preferring not to go out at all because they fear that if a man approaches them, he’s doing it as a joke. This is where you start to think the producers have their thumb on the scale. Although the participants are indeed large—their weight ranges from 180 to 274 pounds—and not the usual version of fat on TV (a size 12 in a baggy dress), the show probably could have found more women in that weight range who have had decent, even happy, relationships in the past. Moreover, the casting contradicts the show’s purported message: that you can find love no matter how you look. The women’s desperation should make viewers root hard for their favorites to get one of those cherished rings, and in that sense, the show succeeds. On the flip side, the rejections seem far more weighty than the ones on the average “Bachelor” episode. Even the kookiest rejectee on that show is generally attractive enough that one can imagine her on a date two days later ordering the most expensive entrée in the most expensive restaurant in her home town. On “More to Love,” one generally pictures the five rejectees going home to their cats and Ben & Jerry’s. Whether or not that reflects the reality of being an overweight woman in America today, it ends the premiere on a sad note.
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