Are You the One may have started work on its upcoming ninth season, but all attention is on the 2017 Season 5 of the show. Contestant Gianna Hammer spoke on TikTok and The Daily Beast about being "drugged" and "sexually assaulted" while filming the MTV dating show. In response, MTV have removed the entire season from streaming services in the U.S. – though not from international streamers or video on demand services.
On her social media and in that interview, Gianna Hammer claims that after a drunken fight with a male cast member, she was given Zoloft, an antidepressant she was on at the time, by producers to calm her down – this despite her doctor warning her to not take the medication while drinking alcohol.
"I know that my castmates said that I kept telling them, 'I'm not supposed to do this when I'm drinking. I'm not supposed to do this when I'm drinking,' Hammer told The Daily Beast, "[but] They still said it was OK, they said it wasn't a high enough dosage or something. So, I took it."
@giannahammer since most my followers on here are super interested in my AYTO experiences and stories. #fyp #sexualassault #realitytv #FindYourCore
♬ original sound - giannahammer
She then alleged that she was told the next day that she got into bed with a male cast member, only to be pulled out of bed by her co-stars after that cast member ignored her saying "no" to him. Fellow cast member Tyranny Todd claims in the same interview that she saw this unnamed Are You The One cast member on top of Hammer.
In the piece, Todd and another cast member Hayden Weaver corroborate Hammer's claims.
Are You The One production company Lighthearted deny the claims. They told The Daily Beast: "We are confident that any review will confirm the safety procotols that we have long had in place on the sets of Are You The One? [sic]
"We deny the allegations made by the former contestant; throughout the eight seasons of the show, no contestant has reported an incident of sexual assault to Lighthearted."
Weaver tweeted about this: "Lighthearted Entertainment has denied these allegations. I can confirm as a witness that Lighthearted Entertainment is full of absolute s***."
MTV told the outlet: "We take these issues very seriously and have paused production/casting to conduct an independent investigation into the allegations, the third party production company and further review our internal safety protocols."
Shortly after these allegations were made public, the show was removed from the ViacomCBS (who own MTV) streaming service Paramount+.
At time of writing, a number of online retailers were still offering Season 5 of the show in full. The whole season is available to purchase on Amazon, Google Play and Vudu now.
The complete season is also available internationally. In the U.K., for example, the season remains available on Now TV.
Newsweek has reached out to MTV about the season still being available to watch online. We will update this article when we receive a response.
Although per MTV casting and production on the show have been paused, a casting call for the upcoming ninth season remains active on the Lighthearted website.
