UN-COUPLING
Love is put to the test in ‘Singletown’
NATASHA “Tash” Finn and Luke Louza are an average twentysomething couple who met on Tinder and have been together for almost three years.
So they solidified their relationship by breaking up and dating other people on television.
They’re part of “Singletown,” a reality series premiering Thursday on HBO Max that originally aired on the UK’s ITV2.
It follows five British couples who are at a crossroads in their relationships.
In addition to Louza and Finn, there’s Elliot Churchley, 25, and Charlie David, 23, who have trust issues; Jeremiah Kanjakwa, 23, and Selin Tursucu, 21, who squabble constantly; Sophie Moran, 18, and George Bird, 21, who are wondering if they’re too young for a long-term commitment; and Claudia Trante, 21 and Rob Greenway, 23, who feel like they’ve lost their spark.
“When we went in there, we didn’t really have any problems that other couples had,” Finn, 24, tells The Post.
Each couple spends the series living the life of a single person in a swank London apartment overlooking the River Thames. The catch? Their recent exes are in an apartment right next door, and they’re often shown footage of what their other halves are up to.
“We got split up [from each other] and had no phone and stuff,” says Louza, 28. “It’s the not knowing what they’re up to that puts doubt in your brain. And it becomes a bit more difficult as the days go on. Going from seeing someone every day to having completely no contact whatsoever was hard. Because even if someone is on holiday, usually you can still text them or phone them.”
The couple live in England’s West Midlands; Louza is an engineer and Finn works as an office administrator. At the beginning of the show, Finn explains that she wants to get married and have a child, while Louza wasn’t sure about that level of commitment just yet.
“That was the idea — thinking of it as a test and way to make the relationship stronger,” she says. At the end of each week on “Singletown,” the couples touch base to decide if they want to get back together and leave the show reunited, or if they want to return to “Singletown,” living the life of a single person with their dating adventures captured onscreen. The series is hosted by Emily Atack (“The Inbetweeners”) and comedian Joel Dommett (“The Masked Singer UK”).
“Originally going in there, we thought this would be a piece of cake, but once you’re put in the situation, it’s hard because you don’t know what the other person is actually doing,” says Finn.
Finn and Louza say they never thought of their break-up as being permanent.
“I was never really really that worried,” says Louza. “But I did get a bit concerned when I saw a video of Tash receiving some flowers [from a man on the show], and she said something along the lines of, ‘Luke never buys me flowers.’ And when I heard that, I thought, ‘Oh no.’ I thought she had a really good date and she might have found someone that she got on with. But apart from that, I think we were the strongest couple in there.”
Spoiler alert — after 11 days apart, they ultimately decide to stay together, and now have a 6-month- old baby boy named Rome. Finn says they got pregnant the night they left the show.
“We came in and realized that we are meant for each other. It solidified it. Seeing the other relationships [helped],” says Louza. “I’m not going to bad-mouth the other relationships; I think some of them are good. But I just think that we would never do some of the things we witnessed.”
The entire experience made Finn realize the value of taking time apart every so often.
“That was kind of a holiday away from each other, because we spent all our time together all the time from the moment we met each other,” she says. “So it was kind of like a nice break to realize, ‘I do miss you and do want to be with you and don’t want to be without you’ sort of thing.”