We all got excited when the Daily Star wrote earlier in the year that the producers of ITV’s Love Island were accepting applications from not only straight contestants but queers ones too. It seems that that was a bit of a red herring sadly.
ITV boss Amanda Savri spoke to the Radio Times about it: ‘There’s been quite a few rumours circulating about featuring gay Islanders, so it’s worth touching on that really. The line-up will be announced within time and it goes without saying that we want to encourage greater inclusivity and diversity.”
Savri continued to beat around the bush saying ‘There’s a sort of logistical difficulty, because although Islanders don’t have to be 100% straight, the format must sort of give [them] an equal choice when coupling up.’ YIKES. We wouldn’t want to be a logistical difficulty! What bit goes in what hole again?
In a very long winded way of saying ‘no’, Savri continued ‘With our dating shows, such as The Cabins, there is much more sexual diversity. The formats don’t have as much restrictions as Love Island. So we’re very sort of mindful of that across our programming on ITV and dating series. But that’s the difficulty with Love Island.’
Well that’s that then. BOO. Former contestant Megan Barton Hanson loved the idea though, and said of a potential LGBTQ+ version ‘Logistically, I don’t know how it would work if they just chucked in a few token gay people in there. I feel like we need a whole gay series. If you’re going to do it, do it properly. I mean, I’d definitely go back on there if there’s a gay season!’
For your amusement, here’s when Phoebe Waller-Bridge hosted SNL and did a Love Island skit. Sometimes you just gotta laugh eh.