We’ve spent lockdown glued to the box...and who can blame us?
VIEWERS spent more time in front of the box than ever before during lockdown and the sexier shows were among the most popular TV turn-ons.
Naughty but nice Netflix drama Bridgerton had millions of us tuning in to the antics of eight siblings looking for love and lust in Regency London.
And when the world felt far from normal, we wanted to watch Normal People, the sizzling BBC romance about a young couple.
Watchdog Ofcom said adults spent five hours and 40 minutes a day – a third of their waking lives – watching TV in 2020, 47 minutes more than in 2019.
And when we wanted something steamy, we got streaming.
Subscriptions to platforms, such as Netflix and Amazon Prime Video rose by 50 per cent to 31 million in lockdown, with adults tuning in for one hour and five minutes every day.
Ofcom said Bridgerton was a “particular success” watched in 8.2 million homes.
The saga, starring Rege-Jean Page as smouldering Duke Simon Bassett, crammed several sultry scenes into its eight episodes and kept us coming back for more.
Normal People, with Daisy Edgar Jones as Marianne and Paul Mescal as Connell, included 10 love scenes in 12 episodes and was one of the most streamed BBC series in lockdown. The
other was Killing Eve, starring Jodie Comer as Villanelle – recently voted the sexiest TV killer of all time.
When we weren’t getting hot under the collar, we were watching old favourites, such as Strictly Come Dancing, I’m A Celebrity and The Great British Bake Off, and smash hit series like The Crown and Line Of Duty.
But we also used TV to keep up with Covid. When Boris Johnson unveiled his roadmap out of lockdown in May, he was watched by 27.68 million, one of the biggest audiences in British TV history.
But the end of lockdown rules signals problems for streamers.
Ofcom’s Yih-Choung Teh said: “The challenge for Amazon and Netflix will be to ensure a healthy pipeline of content to keep customers signed up.”