Q&A with Dr. Andy Baldwin on The Bachelor and what he says everyone should know about reality TV

Tessa Horst and Dr. Andy Baldwin met on the set of ABC's The Bachelor in
2007. Though the couple broke things off, he doesn't regret going on the
show. (Photo courtesy AndyBaldwin.com.)

This is a Q&A with Dr. Andy Baldwin. To read more about his journey on The Bachelor and his current humanitarian work, click here.

Examiner: Do you think that the producers tried to have a hand in your actual decisions? Or was it the editing process after the fact?

Dr. Baldwin: I won’t say that they didn’t try, but nothing that I did was based on what the producers wanted me to do. Every decision I made and everything I said was my own. I can’t say the same for other shows or other people—I really can’t. I think you either stay true to yourself or you can really cave into the pressures. Because they know what people want to watch, and if you start going by what they want you to do, they’ll be happy.

I had my experience and other people had theirs. [The producers] will go in and see how people are talking on these chat rooms and they’ll edit according to that. So they’re just toying with people’s every emotion. So if I had shown, in the end, someone different than Tessa, then the edit you would have seen would have been much different than what you saw.

I always shake my head when people say, “I can tell that he wants to choose her,” or “I can tell that she wants to choose him.” I’m like, “No you don’t. That’s the way they edited it.” America seems to think they’re in that situation with you—and that’s the power of reality television. It’s entertainment.
But these people who really think that they’re there should think again. It’s very emotional and physically demanding experience that you go through there. It’s really hard to express in words, and to know that only a certain number of other people really know what it’s like.

Do you find that people treat you differently because you were on the show? They think they know you?

Dr. Baldwin: Yeah. And that has to be expected. My friends that I’ve had for years and the people that I meet that really take the time to get to know me really know who I am. I’m just a regular guy. And I can assure you every other celebrity, actor or actress, or person in Hollywood is a human being as well. They have just as many problems as everybody else, and probably more.

But when I’m walking down the street and I hear someone say, “Hey Andy!” from across the way, then they run up, I say, “Hey, good to see you.” Because I’m not sure if I really know them or not, before they launch into, “You should have picked this person.” And you’re like, Really man? Were you there? But you have to be nice. Because what else do you expect? They know you because of what they’ve seen on television. Of course on the show, they didn’t show the conversations we had about traveling through Europe and what art museums we went to, or what it felt like to lose a family member to cancer, and what it felt like—the real meat of what it is when you get to know someone emotionally and in-depth. They keep it very superficial or surface level.

The [production crew] said things like, “Andy, we’re all worried because you eliminated all the dramatic girls and there’s not going to be any drama.” I said, “That’s too bad, guys. I’m not here to produce your TV show. I’m here for my reasons. So I’m just going to be myself.” It’s an experience, and I’d be lying to say it wasn’t nice to go down to Central and South America [on deployment] and walk around where people had no idea who I was. There are pros and there are cons to that. And I get to accept that that’s the case.

But it’s also a benefit, because when you go out and speak, when you write a blog about the places you’ve been or when you talk to a bunch of people about the importance of physical fitness—people listen to you. That’s the flip side. There’s a point after the show where I was lamenting and saying, “Oh my goodness. I can’t take this anymore.” But you need to say, okay, this is the reality of this and let’s do good work with this.

Does it surprise you some of the other things that came out of The Bachelor now, with Jason Mesnick and Molly and Melissa? Does that surprise you—the heightened drama that’s happening now?

Dr. Baldwin: [Laughs] No, it’s doesn’t surprise me. And to be honest, I haven’t watched a second of the latest Bachelorette, because I’ve been overseas. But I caught the tail end of Jason’s season. I was concerned because I talked to him before he went on there and tried to give him my best tips and pointers. It was his experience. And I’ve said this before, but I wasn’t there. They were his choices and I’m hearing that he’s happy now, and in the end, that’s what matters.

I just can’t stress enough how alone you can be in that role. There’s no one there that’s looking out for you. You really need to be strong and I feel for a lot of what he’s had to go through, and what people like Brad Womack had to go through. It’s tough. And the American public—especially behind the veil of a computer screen—can be vicious. Maybe I will write that book one day. I just think it’s important to tell people what they don’t know.