The new season of ‘The Bachelor’ in Ukraine shows the scars of war

Backstage at Ukraine’s adaptation of “The Bachelor,” makeup artists rushed to fix fake lashes and lipstick, while producers hunched over monitors and adjusted camera angles. For the crew of 200 and the show’s 21 participants, the night was going to be a particularly grueling shoot.

The strict wartime curfew and rolling power cuts in the wake of sustained Russian strikes on Ukraine’s power grid meant they would have to film the show’s climactic rose ceremony all through the night, from dusk until dawn.

As with every aspect of life in Ukraine, the full-scale invasion in 2022 by Russia has transformed the contest, once the most-watched reality TV show in Ukraine. Forty percent of the camera and lights team was drafted to fight. Curfew restricted working hours so that most of the dating scenes have to be filmed during the day instead of at night, and gone are the exotic foreign shooting locations.

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