Jonathan Ross has come under fire for hosting Channel 4’s new show Handcuffed: Last Pair Standing, which has been described as a “nasty, crass and completely abysmal” social experiment. The series handcuffs two strangers from different backgrounds together for 24 hours a day, including during showers, with a £100,000 prize for the pair that lasts longest.
Pairs were selected for maximum discomfort, including Jo, a plus-size fashion brand owner, and Reuben, who believes fat people are lazy; Tilly, a homeless charity volunteer, and millionaire Anthony; and George, a former prison officer, and aristocrat Sir Benjamin Slade, who owns a painting by Adolf Hitler and has dogs named after Nigel Farage, Boris Johnson and Kwasi Kwarteng.
Critics have called the show a “cheap throwback” to Wife Swap and The Jeremy Kyle Show, accusing producers of manufacturing drama. Ross introduces participants with labels like “a cleaner who can’t stop swearing” and “an alpha male”, while one scene shows Sir Ben’s country house featuring a Hitler painting and statues allegedly depicting enslaved people.
Sir Ben is already a tabloid figure known for a controversial casting call for a wife last year that barred “Guardian readers, Scorpios, drug users, alcoholics, Scots, under 5’6”, people from countries beginning with ‘I’ who have green in their flag and people from countries where they don’t wear overcoats in the winter”. The show has been compared to a “dramatised version of the Daily Mail comments section”.
Despite occasional moments where participants appear to listen to each other, the series has been condemned as “demeaning for everyone involved”, with viewers questioning whether Channel 4’s edgy remit justifies platforming intolerant views.
