Love Island boss on body diversity: we want to be representative but we also want them to fancy each other
Richard Cowles has responded to criticism around Love Island’s lack of body diversity
After months of speculation and anticipation, the Love Island cast for series five was announced this week – but not everyone was impressed with our new set of Islanders.
While the five new girls and seven new boys hail from all across the country and are employed in a range of jobs (this year there's a scientist, a fireman and a sandwich maker in our midst, to name but a few), fans of the show were left disappointed by the ‘slim pickings’ in terms of body diversity, as once again the Islanders were on the whole slim, athletic and toned.
However, Love Island creative director Richard Cowles has defended the line-up, telling RadioTimes.com and other journalists out in Majorca that the show aims to be as “diverse as possible” – within limits.
“First and foremost, it’s an entertainment show and it’s about people wanting to watch who you’ve got on screen falling in love with one another,” he said.
“Yes, we want to be as representative as possible but we also want them to be attracted to one another.
“Also, we’re not saying that everyone that’s in there is how you’re supposed to look. We’re saying here’s a group of people that we want to watch for eight weeks, and we want to watch them fall in love. That’s not at the front of our mind, but we do want to be as diverse as possible.”
ITV executive Angela Jain added, “What we’ve tried to do again is have a huge range of personalities, people, hoping there’s someone in there for everyone and a slice of British life.
“So hopefully lots of different types of people are represented.”
Prior to the initial line-up being revealed, plus-sized model Jada Sezer was rumoured to be entering the villa, after an insider claimed that producers were looking for “more variation” among the Islanders.
And it's still possible she could be in the mix. As is now traditional, a series of new Islanders, known as bombshells, are expected to be hitting the villa as the show continues.
The new series is set for a format tweak in the very first episode too, with not one but two extra boys entering after the first coupling in a bid to shake things up.
Love Island launches Monday 3rd June on ITV2
