Weekend Plans With Former ‘Bachelor’ Host Chris Harrison, Who Never Gave Up On Happily Ever After

Weekend Plans is our exclusive lifestyle feature where we highlight the real off-duty routines of the most exciting people in culture. 

This weekend, Chris Harrison — Emmy-nominated former host of “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?” and the most familiar face behind “The Bachelor” — sits down with The Daily Wire ahead of the premiere of his new faith-based dating show on Fox Nation, “The Vow.” Along with the inspiration behind his latest project, he shares how he turned golf into a philosophy on life, the reason you won’t catch him sipping a latte, and why he never gave up on happily ever after.

***

I’ve already done a fair bit of internet sleuthing before chatting with Chris Harrison, so I recognize the gorgeous details of the Austin, Texas, home he shares with his wife, TV host and producer Lauren Zima. The look blends Chris’ rugged Texan roots with the coastal cool of California, where they met. I’d love to pop open a bottle from their wine collection and take a virtual tour, but I’m here to pitch my top three matches for bachelor Jace Cates after screening episode one of “The Vow.”

Chris laughs at my fantasy bracket, adding, “I think we did a good job but you know … fingers crossed.” The moment Jace led a group prayer to bless the experiment, I knew the show was playing by a different set of rules. I could have watched the entire season in one go.

“It kind of takes me back to the early days,” Chris recalls of waking up to check “The Bachelor” ratings every Tuesday. At its height, it was a cultural juggernaut. “Now we’re starting all over again.”

After serving as the beloved host of “The Bachelor” for 19 years, Chris exited the franchise in 2021 after catching strays around a contestant’s past attendance at a plantation-themed fraternity formal. The timing was tough, following the race riots of 2020. Still, it’s telling that Chris remains close friends with many “Bachelor” stars, while the series he once helmed skates on thin ice amid season-canceling scandal. 

He even reportedly received a cease-and-desist from Warner Bros. before his new series hit the air. Later, he artfully told Entertainment Tonight, “Sounds like somebody misses somebody really bad.”

Now that he’s no longer constrained by rose ceremonies and contestant eliminations, Chris is tapping into the national conversation with “The Vow.” “Let’s raise the bar on what’s expected of men, what’s expected of love, and what’s expected in relationships,” he says. 

“The trend in culture is what prompted it. And seeing the articles about more young people going to church more than their parents for the first time in our country. Hearing stories of youth nights at church and at temples just filled to the brim with young people. There’s something happening in this country and dating apps are falling by the wayside.” 

Chris’ own spiritual journey helps validate the faith-based concept. “My mom’s family is Jewish, and my dad’s family is Christian. I always said I was a little bit of a religious mutt. I was the kid that would go to temple, celebrate Passover, and then also celebrate Christmas and Easter and go to church.” Chris was baptized along with his son in 2001. “While I consider myself a Christian, I still will always consider myself Jewish, if that makes sense.”

For the show, Chris and Lauren bring the entertainment with audience-friendly challenges like having contestants arrange patio furniture and carry firewood while wearing evening gowns. But they were also determined to set the tone for couples to pray on camera. I notice several contestants wearing crosses, with some professing to be “on fire for Jesus.” Luckily, the focus on diversity in casting wasn’t superficial; it was spiritual. 

“Ten women plus Jace are going to walk in with ten very different stories of their faith,” Chris notes. “Some of these women are ‘on fire for Jesus,’ they are on their path and they just got baptized and they’re new to this. That’s fantastic. And then there are those that were born and raised this way. Maybe some are saving themselves for marriage.”

I didn’t watch everything that came out of the Bachelor Nation universe, but I’m pretty sure our Lord and Savior wasn’t the main focus of the Fantasy Suite. 

“Our faith in our own personal life, I think, allowed us to comfortably step in and feel like we will be good stewards of this,” Chris explains. “This is not a cocktail joke. This is not something funny to poke fun at. I feel like we can respectfully shine a light on this world and ask the question: Is this a way to find love in this modern world?” 

I can’t help but notice how Chris doesn’t appear even remotely jaded after everything that’s happened in his life. “You could have been the crankiest guy about love,” I tell him. Considering he’s three years into a joyful second marriage, it seems like he still loves love.

“I do love love and I’ve always been an eternal optimist,” Chris assures me. “There is this insatiable appetite for love in the world. In every culture I visited for 20 years, from Asia to Europe to Australia, the one thing that connects us all is love and companionship.”

The Man Behind The Fame

As the face of competitive matchmaking, and the guy everyone wants to call their best friend, Chris makes me wonder if he turns it on a bit for the cameras, or whether he’s really this warm and friendly in his normal life. 

“I don’t know if I’m the best person to answer this,” he humbly states. (I already have my answer.) “But I would like to think the reason people feel very comfortable coming up to me at the airport, at a restaurant, is because I am the same person.” 

He describes being cast as host of “The Bachelor” specifically because of his approachable nature. “They wanted that confidant and the guy you could lean on and talk to. When I’m hosting ‘Who Wants to Be a Millionaire,’ I’m like, hey, I’m on this journey with you, man. I want you to win a million dollars.” Same goes for hosting “Miss America.” He adds, “I have the same eye and the same heart, whether I’m in front of the camera or just producing and sitting in a garage in the control room.”

More Of A Tea Guy

“I’ve maybe had one cup of coffee in my entire life,” Chris laughs. “I know — there’s the big scoop. I really don’t like coffee at all.” He wakes up around 7 a.m., but not with a cup of joe. He says Lauren’s the coffee drinker in the family.

“People that are reading or seeing this, I know you’re going to come at me,” he says, feigning exhaustion. “‘Have you tried a caramel chocolate chip macchiato? Fresh pressed cinnamon latte with a twist?’ I’ve tried it. I can taste coffee a mile away. I don’t even like tiramisu. That’s how much I don’t like the coffee taste.”

Still, he’s not opposed to caffeine. “I’m a tea drinker,” he explains. “I love my tea. I love all that stuff.” I wonder aloud if he’s secretly British. “You know what? Thank you, Lauren. Because I always tell people I’m European,” he says. “I love a good peacoat, a scarf, and a tea. As a Texas native, you don’t let that get out. I’m proud of my roots, but there’s not a lot of times in Texas where we can really put on a scarf and a good peacoat.”

He also starts every day with a quiet morning spent at his local “ratty, good gym.” He confirms, “It is not, as I call it, the Neiman Marcus gym. It might be a little unsanitary, you might need a tetanus shot later, that’s my kind of gym.”

The Ingredients For The Good Life

Chris’ two children from his first marriage, Josh and Taylor, live in Austin near their dad. After graduating from Texas Christian University, they’re currently “crushing it,” Chris assures me, adding, “They’re both phenomenal human beings and good citizens.”

With busy schedules always on the horizon, Chris takes advantage of family time spent sharing a meal together. “I love to cook,” he says. “So my favorite nights are where I get to cook for everybody. Everybody’s in the kitchen talking, spilling the tea, catching up. We open a nice bottle of wine and we sit down at the table — no TVs, no devices — and then we play Monopoly or a game of Sorry! or just silly stuff where we’re all laughing and making fun of each other.”

We commiserate over the fact that, contrary to its name, Sorry! isn’t sorry. “It’s a vicious, horrible game,” he says with a laugh. “You learn a lot about people because while you say you’re sorry, you still send them back. We call it the ‘bless your heart.’”

As far as what’s on the menu, Chris says, “Not to be a total guy, but I do love to grill.” But if he’s not flipping steaks, he’s basically starring on a one-person competitive cooking show executive-produced by his wife. “My favorite thing, honestly, is when Lauren will just send me a recipe. She’ll just go, ‘You know what? I’m in the mood for this soup,’ and I’ll go make it. I love to just go to my local H-E-B here which is the best grocery store in the world. I love going through and getting all the ingredients, coming home, and spending a couple of hours making dinner.”

Lauren handles the baking (Chris says she makes a mean banana bread). And they won’t say no to an Old World Bordeaux or “escaping in the fall and going back to Napa and watching the leaves change and enjoying a good Napa cab. It’s hard to beat.”

The Philosophy Of Golf

I ask Chris to name the one luxury he couldn’t live without. “My golf clubs,” he confirms, no question. They’re not sentimental or historical, but they’re clearly essential. “If I came home and someone stole my golf clubs, I would just be like, I gotta go get some more.” Hitting a few balls at the range while listening to George Strait, Willie Nelson, or Lyle Lovett is Chris’ go-to strategy for restoring equilibrium.

“I’m a big outdoorsman,” he says. “I grew up as an outdoorsman here in Texas, hunting and fishing. I love to get down. I see my brother down in South Texas and we go fishing. But I love golf.”

“There’s the cliché of the golf guy,” he adds. “A lot of that is just being outside for three or four hours and walking and just kind of forgetting everything and pretending like hitting a ball is important.”

After playing soccer through college, Chris pivoted onto the green. “Once I graduated and became a sportscaster, I really fell in love with golf and started playing in some of these tournaments.” 

He’s been a golf guy ever since. “This is going to really make me sound nerdy,” he warns me. “I saw this podcast, and I bought the book immediately called ‘Fearless Golf.’” The pod featured Gio Valiante, renowned performance coach. “I was like, wow, what he’s saying about golf is applicable to life and business — about being fearless.”

When I ask if he’ll share his favorite life motto, Chris explains, “Well, it’s sitting on the desk behind me. A little thing that my mom gave me a long time ago: ‘What would you attempt to do if you knew you could not fail?’” He’s been optimistically diving all-in on every venture ever since.

“I don’t know if ‘The Vow’ is going to be successful,” he says. “There’s no guarantee just because I did this one thing a long time ago that people will necessarily follow me into the next one. But you have to go into it fearless and not afraid to fail. If you go into something thinking about the possibility of failure, worrying about where the hazards are, then you’re going to fall into them.”

“I’ve never succeeded all the time. I failed many times in life,” he adds. “But I’m darn sure going to put everything I have into it and try to succeed. In real life, we have seasons, good and bad. And we’re in a really good season right now. So you’ve got to enjoy that because that too shall pass.”

“The Vow” streams Wednesdays on Fox Nation.