ITV2 goes back in time with Bromans as it seeks next reality TV hit

david mcintosh
(Image credit: Startraks Photo/REX/Shutterstock)

ITV2's Bromans will feature eight couples holed up in a Roman palace and the men and women competing for cash prizes

How do you top Love Island? Well, ITV2 is going back in time with its latest reality TV show, which will see a team of eight brave men and their partners find out if they have what it takes to make it as real gladiators.

They will be transported back 2,000 years to the Roman Empire in the new reality series, Bromans, due to screen later this year.

Radio star Roman Kemp will narrate the eight-part show as cameras follow the couples recreating ancient life in a shared Roman palace.

The women will try their hand at tasks such as wine-making and sculpting as they help their brave boyfriends through a series of tough physical challenges.

Capital FM Summertime Ball 2017 – London

A real Roman joins the show (Chris Ratcliffe/PA)

 

The best of the boys will make it through to the Emperor’s Games where they will face each other in the colosseum for the chance to win a £10,000 prize.

Bromans will also feature David McIntosh (pictured) as the fearsome trainer Doctore and Tom Bell as the Emperor’s assistant, Dominus.

Ben Kelly, the show’s executive producer, said: “The Romans gave us roads, viaducts and basic sanitation, but Bromans may prove to be their greatest legacy.

“Over eight weeks our couples will train, live and carpe diem together, all the while battling to triumph at the Emperor’s Games… It is ancient Rome like you’ve never seen it before.”

Head of entertainment commissioning at ITV, Siobhan Greene, promised a reality series 'like no other' and packed with 'funny, sexy and super competitive antics'.

Patrick McLennan

Patrick McLennan is a London-based journalist and documentary maker who has worked as a writer, sub-editor, digital editor and TV producer in the UK and New Zealand. His CV includes spells as a news producer at the BBC and TVNZ, as well as web editor for Time Inc UK. He has produced TV news and entertainment features on personalities as diverse as Nick Cave, Tom Hardy, Clive James, Jodie Marsh and Kevin Bacon and he co-produced and directed The Ponds, which has screened in UK cinemas, BBC Four and is currently available on Netflix. 


An entertainment writer with a diverse taste in TV and film, he lists Seinfeld, The Sopranos, The Chase, The Thick of It and Detectorists among his favourite shows, but steers well clear of most sci-fi.