Dom's Dating Dilemma I'm Looking For Love Too!

The host with the most wants a Kiwi soulmate.

- Ashleigh Mcenaney

Juggling his gigs as backstage presenter on Dancing with the Stars USA and the Kiwi correspondent for the E! channel, Dominic Bowden had a good thing going on in Los Angeles when he got the call asking if he’d host The Bachelor New Zealand. But he didn’t think twice about getting on the first plane home.

After almost a decade of setting – and smashing – goals in La La Land, the popular TV presenter tells Woman’s Day that the glitz and glam of the world’s showbiz capital just doesn’t do it for him any more.

“America has always been the place that’s fascinated me,” explains Dom. “In my line of work, it really is the top of the totem pole – I never ever thought I’d get a chance to exist and work there. Everything in Los Angeles just seems bigger and better, but after a while, you do get jaded.

“Once you’ve been to enough big concerts and the coolest parties, it feels a little like Groundhog Day, and what you really strive for are real and authentic experiences. That stuff about LA being a superficial city, well, it’s entirely true.”

When the 40-year-old star recounts his career highlights – including interviewing Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie just weeks before they announced their split – all roads lead back to the United States, but the one thing the bright lights of Hollywood could never offer Dom was true “inner happiness”, he says.