‘Naked Attraction,’ Brutal Full-Frontal Nude Dating Show, Quietly Added to Max
It’s like being on Tinder, but so much worse.
One of the U.K.’s most infamous dating shows (censored trailer below) was quietly added to the Max streaming service last week, and it’s already causing quite a stir.
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The streamer has imported six seasons of Naked Attraction, a game show that promises to “start where a good date often ends — naked.” In each episode, a single “chooser” critiques and eliminates six potential dates standing on a stage by scrutinizing their fully nude bodies, which are gradually revealed one part at a time (faces are revealed last). When only two potential dates remain, the chooser strips out of their own clothes too, giving the remaining two contestants the opportunity to critique them. The final couple then go out on a date, with their clothes on.
The episodes on Max are uncensored, but have added a warning at the beginning of each: “The following series is intended only for mature audiences. It contains full frontal nudity, coarse language, and graphic discussions about the human body. Viewer discretion is advised.”
Naked Attraction can come across as rather jaw-droppingly brutal in the contestants’ graphic analysis and dismissal of people based on their most private of parts, with contestants being dismissed for every superficial reason you can imagine (“I don’t like her feet” … “His member is too small,” etc.). At the same time, each episode contains interstitials of informative sex education, and the show clearly tries to promote body confidence and positivity amid all the “hot or not” judgments. The show also includes contestants of diverse sexual orientations.
Here’s a censored version of the U.S. trailer (which was released several days after this story was published):
U.S. viewers are just starting to stumble onto the series, which was released without a trailer or media fanfare (Max listed it among dozens of titles coming to the streamer in September). “My fkn sister just put me on to this ‘naked attraction’ show and this is the craziest shit i EVER watched on tv,” wrote one viewer. “There is something so cringe about watching the body language of a naked man who has been rejected,” wrote another. “I kinda hate the way things are and shouldn’t be watching this (I’m contributing to the demand), but I’m fascinated by this.” Syndicated radio host Bert Weiss dubbed it “the most shocking show I’ve ever watched.”
But many are defending show: “Despite the nudity, it isn’t supposed to be titillating or dramatic or anything. … The contestants are just normal people with normal flaws, and the format promotes an open healthy discussion of sex with the participants,” wrote a viewer on Reddit. “A lot of Americans might actually benefit from seeing this,” opined another. “There’s a surprising diversity of contestants, bodies and tastes, talked about pretty matter of factly.” And another: “It’s nice to see cuz the media & xxx has conditioned us to see bodies in a certain unrelatable way, usually too perfect/airbrushed.”
And on ABC’s The View on Monday, host Sunny Hostin said, “I’m embarrassed to admit, [my husband Emmanuel] and I got so obsessed with this show we binged it yesterday … and I learned things I have never heard of in my life. It was one of the most fascinating things I’ve ever seen.”
Ana Navarro joked, “This is even worse to me than Naked and Afraid. It’s Naked and Well Lit.”
Yet conservative watchdog group the Parents Television Council slammed HBO for the show (to be clear, the show is on Max, which is the streaming home of HBO content, but the show is not made by HBO): “Naked Attraction should not exist on the Max streaming platform, and HBO should immediately remove this exploitative, pornographic program,” the group said in a statement released Monday. “Max has mediocre parental controls, enabling children to access some of the most explicit streaming content on the market. There is no doubt children will be able to easily access Naked Attraction, the purpose of which is to shock and titillate the audience with uncensored and explicit nudity. And in a new low for HBO, the show fully exploits its own participants, somehow convincing them that their exploitation for the purpose of dating is right and good … [HBO] gives the appearance of a trusted family brand by hosting Harry Potter and Sesame Street, but HBO has now lifted its own veil, revealing that it is and always was a pornography channel.”
U.S. reviewers haven’t weighed in yet, but in the U.K., TV critics blasted the show, with The Telegraph writing: “How low can this dating show go?” And BuzzFeed UK declaring it “the most utterly stupid dating show on TV.” U.K. broadcast regulator Ofcom received more than 1,000 complaints about the show’s nudity, but ultimately ruled the footage “was justified in the context of the program.”
The show, hosted by Anna Richardson, debuted in 2016 and has aired six seasons, with a seventh currently airing in the U.K. on Channel 4. Watch it on Max with a 7-day free trial here.
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