Jennifer Nettles is ready to round up a new crop of singles when season 2 of Farmer Wants a Wife premieres on FOX Thursday, February 1.
The show introduces four bachelor farmers — Ty Ferrell, Mitchell Kolinsky, Brandon Rogers and Nathan Smothers — to 32 single ladies from all over the country looking for love on the range. Hosted by superstar entertainer and Grammy Award winner Nettles, the show takes women out of their city-living comfort zones to try their hand at life and love on the farm, embarking on an adventure that could change the course of their lives forever.
Season 1 was both a ratings and romantic success, with three of the four farmers finding love on the show. (However, by the end of 2023 all of the couples had called it quits.) Host Nettles told Us Weekly that it’s that real-life love story — happy ending or not — that brought her back onboard.
“I’m not a fan of [traditional] dating shows. I don’t watch them,” she said. “It’s usually a bunch of overdramatic people in hysterics trying to get their 15 seconds of fame. But I watched a couple episodes [of the original British version of the show] and I was in. These are people who are coming on in search of their forever person. I loved being part of season one. What an honor and a joy it is to witness and to facilitate all of these people on a journey to try and find love.”
The British reality show of the same name is one of the most successful dating shows in the world, with FOX claiming it has resulted in 201 marriages and 514 children already.
“One of the things that attracted me to the show was that both the women and the men have agency to decide that if this isn’t them, this isn’t for them,” Nettles said. “Sometimes the guys feel like they don’t have a connection with a specific woman, and they will have those hard conversations. But on the converse, oftentimes, the women decide that the situation — the lifestyle or the farmer, or some mixture of all of those things — aren’t for them, and they will opt to leave. I found that, at first, very surprising, and then immediately very refreshing. Because it really does underscore the authenticity of the show. People aren’t just there to try to be famous, and if they’re there for love, and if they’re not feeling like love is gonna result from a connection they’re going to go home.”
For Nettles, the role of host allows her to foster a unique relationship with the contestants. “The term I’ve heard used by the farmers is counselor,” she said. “I give that a little bit more flair and call it a godmother, like a fairy godmother. I’m super emotionally invested in these folks, and I want them to find love. I want to be able to help them find it and help them on their journey wherever that takes them.”
She told Us that this season’s farmers are more than ready to find their perfect matches—three of them even watched the show to prepare. “They know that they’re here to find love. They know what they’re getting into,” she said.
That doesn’t mean it’s all sunshine and good harvests for the farmers. Nettles says to expect the unexpected in season 2.
She concluded: “I can’t give it all away, but there are some things that get thrown their way that they aren’t expecting that sort of mix things up for their dynamics on the farm and off and it’s exciting.”
Farmer Wants a Wife season 2 premieres on FOX Thursday, February 1, at 9:00 p.m. ET.
