Foxtel and E! Networks have been censured by the Advertising Standards Bureau for press and outdoor ads promoting a TV show featuring a woman standing in a suggestive manner and a man looking up her dress with his hand reaching up to her thigh.
The ads for late night US talk show Chelsea Lately, broadcast on E! channel, also features the copy: “Chelsea Lately – Comedy with Balls”.
The man in the ads, Chuy Bravo, is the on-screen assistant of the show’s presenter Chelsea Handler. The creative aimed to highlight the irreverent nature of the show and the relationship between the two in the male-dominated world of late-night TV.
However, it was found in two separate rulings that the sexual nature of the outdoor and press ads respectively meant that they were inappropriately placed in outdoor panels and in a newspaper TV guide – both of which are viewable by children.
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E! Networks has since amended the ads so that Bravo has been entirely removed.