New Irish reality TV show ‘Tallafornia’ viewed as porn without sex - VIDEOS

It began as an Irish reality show, following the lives of seven randy twenty-something blue collar Dubliners, but now it's getting interest from Time Magazine and MTV after just one episode.

Called Tallafornia, a mash up of the Dublin working class suburb of Tallaght, where the participants hail from, and a nod to the sun bed culture that is as close as they come to California, the show has already won admirers and critics in equal numbers in Ireland.

Living together in a specially designed Tallaght house, replete with a so-called 'Score Room,' that has not yet been used — we're introduced to David, Jay, Phil, Cormac, Nikita, Kelly, and Natalie, who waste no time in stripping off and hooking up with each other.  Not everyone is thrilled. Critics have already called the TV3 show embarrassing and trashy, and not in a good way. But not everyone is hating it; it has pulled in more than 500,000 viewers for its pilot episode.

Sheena McGinley, Editor of Entertainment.ie, told the Irish Examiner: 'Tallafornia is a bit like porn without the sex — complete with hot tub action, constant bikini-wearing, stilted conversation and orchestrated scenarios.

'To be honest, I only half-watched the first episode, as enough of my precious time is already spent reviewing soaps. But with muscles and bawdiness over brains and scintillating dialogue, it’s bound to do well with a certain demographic.'

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The show’s producer, Fintan Maguire, told the Irish Examiner: 'I knew the show would get a mixed reaction. But I wasn’t expecting people to love or hate it so absolutely.'  '

‘People all over the world are talking about Tallafornia — it trended at number 3 worldwide and ended up on Time Magazine and MTV’s websites. And maybe it’s rose-tinted glasses, but for me, the positive feedback outweighs the negative.'  

Barometer of all things trending, Irish bookmakers Paddy Power, are now offering 1/3 odds that Tallafornia will be snapped up by MTV here in the US, where the Jersey Shore and the Geordie Shore are already hits.

'I wouldn’t say no to anything depending on the rates,' Tallafornia star Kelly Donegan, 22, told the Examiner. 'Definitely I’d do the glamour modelling kind of thing. I’d love to do Playboy, if the money was right – why not?’

Tallafornia could be seen as another nail in the coffin of culture,' adds Sheena McGinley of Entertainment.ie. 'But you don’t have to watch – there are plenty of great alternatives like Downton Abbey, Mildred Pierce and The Killing.  'I will say one thing in Tallafornia’s favour, though — for a change, there are more scantily-clad men than women!'  

Here's the promo for "Tallafornia" on TV3: