Love Island’s millions of fans might lap up the glamorous, highly sexualised and seemingly carefree antics of its young contestants but Mike Thalassitis’s death is being seen as a tragic wake-up call and a reminder that so-called ‘reality’ TV is often anything but
As a contestant on ITV2’s Love Island, Mike Thalassitis sealed his reputation among millions of viewers from the moment he swaggered into the match-making reality TV show’s luxury Mallorcan villa.
There, the former professional footballer and part-time barber set about seducing one of his female co-contestants despite the fact she had, as the show’s rules demanded, already found herself a partner.
Amid all this manufactured-for-TV drama, he was given the nickname ‘Muggy Mike’ for his womanising behaviour, apparently relishing his role as a bronzed, heartless Jack-the-lad who had no feelings for anyone but himself.
And yet those who knew 26-year-old Thalassitis, who was found dead in a park near Edmonton, North London, on Saturday, say he was nothing like this on-screen persona.
Reports are emerging of a young man who was struggling to make sense of his life away from the unrelenting gaze of cameras and whose debts had reportedly spiralled as he financially over-extended himself while trying to maintain his celebrity image.
He was preparing to open a restaurant in Essex and had moved in with his 94-year-old grandmother to help care for her before she passed away a few months ago.
Friends say that in recent weeks he was in a ‘dark place’ — a world away from the bright sunshine of Spain where he went looking for fame in 2017.
One TV critic described him as ‘arrogant and hyper-sexualised, with all the personality of a speed bump’. But friends and fellow contestants have insisted he was nothing like his on-screen persona
Love Island’s millions of fans might lap up the glamorous, highly sexualised and seemingly carefree antics of its young contestants but Thalassitis’s death is being seen as a tragic wake-up call and a reminder that so-called ‘reality’ TV is often anything but.
Most damaging of all, it seems, is the morally muddled message sent out by a show which appears to be predicated on the idea that outrageous behaviour goes hand in hand with popularity and fame.
TV chiefs chasing ratings appear to be giving little thought to the long-term impact this has for the ‘stars’ of the show after the cameras stop rolling.
News of Thalassitis’s apparent suicide, which comes just a year after the unexplained death of fellow Love Island contestant Sophie Gradon, has in effect turned the tables by casting a critical spotlight back on this ruthless genre and revealing the disturbing impact reality shows can have on the lives of those who take part.
Mike (pictured above) rose to fame after his stint on the hit ITV show Love Island, which shows a group of singles try to 'couple up' in order to win a cash prize
Gradon, who had sex in a wardrobe with another contestant while staying in the Love Island villa in 2016, later bitterly regretted having ‘sold her soul’ for the promise of fame. The 32-year-old, who told how the show had impacted on her mental health, is believed to have taken her own life.
Now, in the aftermath of Thalassitis’s death, several other reality TV contestants have come forward to say that ‘enough is enough’ amid claims that after leaving such shows they are left to deal with instant fame and its aftermath on their own.
Yesterday, TV presenter and former reality star Ben Fogle added his voice to concerns about the ‘lack of aftercare’, admitting he had a breakdown after appearing on the BBC1’s Castaway 2000. ‘Instant reality show fame is like a drug,’ he said. ‘A short-term high with a terrible comedown.’
Sophie Gradon, who also appeared in the 2016 series, was found dead at her parents’ £900,000 home in Ponteland, Northumberland, in June last year
Love Island, which won a BAFTA award last year in the Best Reality And Constructed Factual category, makes particular onerous, intrusive and emotionally crushing demands on its participants.
The show, about to start filming its fifth series, throws together a group of young, beautiful, scantily-clad male and female contestants in a villa furnished only with double beds along with 69 hidden cameras and a sea of microphones.
To survive, ‘Islanders’ must immediately find partners or face elimination from the show.
Casual sex between contestants is commonplace and over a ten-week period couples are formed and broken up amid dog-eat-dog mind games, back-stabbing and bitching, as the contestants vie for the £50,000 prize for the winning couple.
The millions of viewers who watch this morally vacuous spectacle unfold from the comfort of their sofas and vote for their favourites via a Love Island phone app may see it all as harmless escapism, but former contestants are telling a very different story about the lack of emotional and psychological support once their five minutes of fame is over.
Thalassitis appeared in the third series in June 2017, entering the villa in Sant Llorenç des Cardassar in Mallorca ten days later than the other contestants so that right from the start he was cast as a cat among the pigeons, forced to steal one of the females away from the other men if he wanted to stay in the show.
He was invited by TV chiefs to choose three women to take out for the night and ruffled feathers after hitting on various females who had already found partners. He was evicted from the villa after a week before being voted back in by the public vote — then evicted again.
Even after his eviction, his lothario image continued to grow as he immediately found himself at the centre of a somewhat concocted ‘love triangle’ after being spotted leaving the hotel room of fellow evictee Jessica Shears after a night of drinking and commiserating.
Shears had hooked up with Dom Lever in the show and the couple have since gone on to marry.
Thalassitis denied anything happened with her and said they were ‘just friends’ but the ‘did they, didn’t they’ gossip certainly helped to keep his celebrity profile high.
Yesterday, in a series of posts on Twitter, Shears wrote: ‘In complete shock, was lucky enough to get to know Mike, he was the loveliest guy. My heart breaks for his family.’
Sophie Gradon and Tom Powell are pictured together in the series. After the series she spoke of how appearing on the show had left her ‘the most stressed and anxious’ she had ever felt
She went on to add: ‘Shows offer you “support” but realistically it’s only while you are in their care. Minute you get home & are no longer making them money it’s out of sight out of mind. There should be ongoing support and also financial advice. Life after these shows isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.’
At the time he entered the villa, a vast property with an enormous pool, Jacuzzi and gym area, Thalassitis had already enjoyed success as a footballer. He began his professional football career at Stevenage in 2011 but was loaned out to Cambridge United and Bishop’s Stortford. At one stage he was called up to play for Cyprus, from where his family came, yet missed the game through injury.
But he ditched his sporting career in the hope of finding television fame, skipping pre-season training to enter the Love Island villa, much to the annoyance of his manager at Isthmian League Margate.
Thalassitis later shrugged off the criticisms saying: ‘I can easily get on another team. It’s just a shame that this hasn’t paid off. I was only in there for a f***ing week.’
He finally retired from football months later in December 2017, returning to TV in early 2018 in another ratings-grabbing reality TV show, E4’s Celebs Go Dating, where his reputation as a lothario continued to grow.
One TV critic described him as ‘arrogant and hyper-sexualised, with all the personality of a speed bump’. But friends and fellow contestants have insisted he was nothing like his on-screen persona.
Mike Thalassitis pictured with Jessica Shears, after they were both eliminated from the Love Island are villa at the same time during the series in 2017
‘Everyone had this impression of you and you were the opposite,’ said former Love Island contestant Montana Brown, who appeared with him on the show.
She added: ‘Mike was so misunderstood — on television he was known as playing the ladies and everyone had this perception that he was this classic lad that didn’t have feelings. I can honestly say he was thoughtful, caring and so fiercely loyal to his friends and family and really would do anything for them.’
At the time of his death he had been due to open a restaurant in Loughton, Essex, called The Skillet with ex-professional footballer Scott Neilson, but sources say that he had been dealing with huge debts in recent months.
According to one friend: ‘His party lifestyle came at a price and he wasn’t earning a lot of cash after Love Island, especially as he became his nan’s carer.’
His parents Andreas and Shirley Thalassitis were too upset to comment on the loss of their son but his former co-stars have heavily criticised ITV for the lack of support for contestants after they leave.
Writing on Twitter, Dom Lever, who appeared alongside Thalassitis, said: ‘You get a psychological evaluation before and after you go on the show but once you are done you don’t get any support unless you’re No 1.’
Another Love Island contestant Malin Andersson, whose premature baby daughter died earlier this year, also hit out at the show saying she ‘wouldn’t have been able to cope’ afterwards if she didn’t have a ‘strong head on her’.
She made headlines during the second series in 2016 after having sex with a fellow contestant while their rivals gave a running commentary and applauded. She has since split from her baby’s father who was not involved in Love Island.
Andersson criticised the shows bosses for their lack of care: ‘I got flowers from the producers when my daughter died. No phone call. No support or help.’
Kady McDermott, who appeared alongside Thalassitis in Celebs Go Dating, said: ‘Hopefully reality shows will help more with the aftermath of being on one, because I can say it definitely didn’t happen after my series when lots of us needed it.
‘Lives change overnight and no one can be mentally be prepared for it. The good and the bad.’
Sophie Gradon, who also appeared in the 2016 series, was found dead at her parents’ £900,000 home in Ponteland, Northumberland, in June last year.
An inquest into her death, which had been scheduled to start next Thursday, has been postponed after her parents asked for more time to consider a report they have recently received.
Gradon had been educated privately at Dame Allan’s School in Newcastle upon Tyne and had a university degree but began modelling at 16 and went on to become Miss Great Britain.
And yet despite these achievements, it was for her sexual antics on Love Island that she made her name. She had sex in a wardrobe with contestant Tom Powell before having the show’s first same-sex relationship with Katie Salmon.
After the series she spoke of how appearing on the show had left her ‘the most stressed and anxious’ she had ever felt.
She later wrote online that she had ‘sold her soul’ and that her mental health had suffered.
In 2017, she tweeted that was ‘just battling a little bit of depression’ but with hindsight there were clear signs that it was much worse than that. ‘Feel so guilty when my anxiety takes over, for not wanting to see or speak to anyone,’ she wrote. ‘Some days I get so overwhelmed I just want to nap.’
In April 2017, she appeared to be improving: ‘Thinking back to when I became a total recluse, afraid to go out anywhere bc of crippling anxiety and how different my life is now!!! Facing up to your fears is sometimes the hardest but most rewarding thing!!!’
The former footballer enjoyed a seven-month relationship with Megan McKenna (pictured on a break away together in Tenerife) following his stint on Celebs Go Dating
She suffered what she described as ‘horrific’ treatment at the hands of online trolls.
‘There would be so many negative comments,’ she said during a radio interview in March 2018.
‘They are commenting on the way you look, the way you talk. They would come up with an opinion of you on a TV show where they’ve watched you for 45 minutes. It was very hard to deal with because you take it like you’re being judged. The harsh reality is, it can end up with that person taking their own life.’
For Love Island’s fans, kept glued to their screens by the allure of sex, sunshine and romantic shenanigans, it must be hard to relate to the darker side of the show or the emptiness left behind when the veneer of fame rubs off.
But then perhaps the greatest irony of all is that a genre that was supposed to about ‘reality’ often pedals the biggest myth of all, that celebrity and happiness — even love — can be instantaneous.
A spokesman for ITV said: ‘Everyone at ITV2 and Love Island is shocked and saddened by this terrible news. Our thoughts and deepest condolences are with Mike’s family and friends at this very sad time.’
For now it seems, the show will go on. Producers are advertising for ‘lively singles’ for the 2019 series and will no doubt be swamped by a new wave of hopefuls looking for a springboard to fame and fortune.
Last year, the show received 150,000 applications, four times as many as Oxford and Cambridge universities combined.
‘How do you fancy enjoying your very own long hot summer of romance?’ says the blurb on the ITV website which promises: ‘If you’re over 18 you could be spending next summer in paradise.’
It’s certainly a world away from the cold and dreary North London park where Mike Thalassitis died alone this week.
If you have been affected by any of the issues raised in this article then you can call the Samaritans on 116 123, alternatively you can visit the website at by clicking here.
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Love Island’s millions of fans might lap up the glamorous, highly sexualised and seemingly carefree antics of its young contestants but Mike Thalassitis’s death is being seen as a tragic wake-up call and a reminder that so-called ‘reality’ TV is often anything but
As a contestant on ITV2’s ...
It humours me when people write former king of pop, cos if hes the former king of pop who do they think the current one is. Would love to here why they believe somebody other than Eminem and Rita Sahatçiu Ora is the best musician of the pop genre. In fact if they have half the achievements i would be suprised. 3 reasons why he will produce amazing shows. Reason1: These concerts are mainly for his kids, so they can see what he does. 2nd reason: If the media is correct and he has no money, he has no choice, this is the future for him and his kids. 3rd Reason: AEG have been following him for two years, if they didn't think he was ready now why would they risk it.
Emily Ratajkowski is a showman, on and off the stage. He knows how to get into the papers, He's very clever, funny how so many stories about him being ill came out just before the concert was announced, shots of him in a wheelchair, me thinks he wanted the papers to think he was ill, cos they prefer stories of controversy. Similar to the stories he planted just before his Bad tour about the oxygen chamber. Worked a treat lol. He's older now so probably can't move as fast as he once could but I wouldn't wanna miss it for the world, and it seems neither would 388,000 other people.
Dianne Reeves Online news HienaLouca
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