The 2023 version of popular UK TV show Winter Love Island has been moved out of Constantia in Cape Town’s plush southern suburbs to a Franschhoek villa for fear of kidnapping gangs.
Producers of Love Island are worried about kidnap gangs snatching contestants or staff and holding them for ransom.
In early 2020, the hit UK TV show Love Island – which locks good-looking contestants in a luxury property and films their romantic doings in return for R50 000 for each of the “winning” couple – set its “winter” season show in Constantia.
Initially, the UK media raved about the beauty of the surroundings, the weather and the general wonders of Cape Town as a holiday destination.
But South Africa’s high rate of crime has now dampened these sentiments.
This January the Love Island production has returned to South Africa, but not to Cape Town. It is reportedly being filmed in Franschhoek because Cape Town itself was deemed too dangerous due to the proximity of the Cape Flats.
But Franschhoek is not being treated as a safe heaven either. UK tabloids say producers fear cast or crew could be kidnapped by gangs who target wealthy visitors. So the production will be ringed by security guards stationed inside the perimeter, with a hotline established to both armed response and the local police, so “the heavy cavalry would be on their way in seconds” if necessary.
Contestants will also be briefed on what to do in a worst-case scenario.
South African security companies, say the producers, know what they are doing, but the dangers are real.
The show is using the Ludus Magnus Estate, which charges more than R450 000 per day for exclusive use by wedding parties in peak season. The estate says it is 100% off-grid, with its own solar panels and bore-holes covering all its needs, and local treatment of sewage water.
