How Lauren Zima turned her love of ‘The Bachelor’ into the career of her dreams
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If you consider yourself to be part of Bachelor Nation, chances are you’re familiar with Lauren Zima.
Over the last five years or so, the Entertainment Tonight correspondent has solidified herself as one of the most dependable sources of Bachelor-related scoop, interviews with the franchise’s top stars and commentary on the ever-expanding Bachelor universe through her recap show, Roses and Rosé.
While she covers more than just The Bachelor at ET, Zima has certainly gone all-in with the show and, having spent so much time with so many of the its most recognizable personalities, has naturally embedded herself within Bachelor Nation. In addition to cultivating friendships with former franchise leads like Ben Higgins and Kaitlyn Bristowe, she has also been dating longtime host Chris Harrison for two years now.
For the latest episode of In The Know’s podcast, We Should Talk, Gibson Johns interviewed Lauren Zima about what it’s like being both professionally and personally invested in Bachelor Nation, how she grew her career and created Roses and Rosé, her thoughts on the unusual current season of The Bachelorette, and her upcoming podcast, which is due out later this month.
Listen to Lauren Zima’s full episode of We Should Talk below, and keep reading for highlights from the interview:
On how Clare Crawley handled being the Bachelorette: “I think that Clare handled the situation as Clare, you know? Would I have handled it differently in the moment? Absolutely. But that is based on what I’ve been through. I’ve rushed into very serious relationships too quickly before, so I’m pretty hesitant about that personally. But I think Clare is a person who, we heard her say that she thinks she and Dale met in another realm. We saw her with her crystals, and I think Clare is a very spiritual person. Especially having seen her parents fall in love very quickly and knowing they had a good relationship, the stars just aligned for that to be the way she reacted to [realizing], ‘I feel like I have a connection with this person.’ She did what she would’ve done in that situation.”
On her Bachelor recap show, Roses and Rosé: “Roses and Rosé is my Bachelor franchise recap review show, so I created and host that under the umbrella of Entertainment Tonight. […] I don’t think there was ever one moment specifically, but I do remember when I did sort of peek my eye open and look at some of the comments on YouTube, because our YouTube manager told me, ‘You have unusually positive YouTube comments.’ And people were saying they loved it. That response, as small as it might’ve been at the time, I just thought, ‘If people like something — if you have an amount of people who like something — how can you look at what they’re liking, magnify that, explore that, build it up? And then more people will come to that.’ It was like I had this little focus group. I’ve truly just worked on building it over the years. We didn’t have one moment where a clip went viral, it’s just been a slow and steady build.”
On dating Bachelor host Chris Harrison: “When we first started dating, I went and talked to everybody at ET about it when we were getting serious. We both kind of made that decision that we were only going to go public with this if it was really serious, because otherwise it wasn’t worth the trouble. It was never a problem. It was just because we really tried to handle it like adults and just say, ‘We’re two adults in a relationship.’ Shockingly, we have a lot in common, and we do so much of the same thing that, at one point, when we were both single and available, we realized, ‘Oh, we’re bonding over this, and we’re attracted to each other.'”
On interviewing Bachelor stars that she’s friends with: “Look, journalism is storytelling. and there’s a humanity to storytelling and we tell our best stories when we’re being human and seeing other people as human. On The Bachelor, as much as it is this reality show, you’re asking people about their love stories and painful emotional things, so you have to have a humanity to you. I think you get the best interviews and the most honest sharing from people when they can feel that. So, it would be impossible to sit down with someone and ask them about their most personal, vulnerable moments without having some level of a connection with them.”
Watch In The Know’s full interview with Lauren Zima below:
If you enjoyed this story, check out another recent episode of We Should Talk featuring podcast host Danny Pellegrino!
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