‘Below Deck Down Under’ praised for removing naked crew member from sleeping castmate’s bed
The production team and cast of “Below Deck Down Under” are being commended for their handling of consent issues after Monday night’s episode featured a naked man entering a woman’s bed while she was unconscious.
The episode of the Bravo reality series, which follows the crew of a superyacht on their voyages at sea, opens with the cast returning from an evening out in Cairns, Australia.
Margot Sisson, who works on the charter vessel, is seen going to bed. At the end of the previous episode, Sisson was intoxicated and told the ship’s chief steward, Aesha Scott, that she wanted to sleep — and “no Luke.”
Once Scott has left Sisson to deal with a power outage, castmate Luke Jones enters Sisson’s bedroom in a towel while she is asleep.
Camera and production crew members step in to ask Jones to leave after he climbs into her bed. Jones also appears intoxicated.
“Luke, we gotta get you down,” a production member says. “I gotta get you out of here, because she wants to go to bed.”
Jones eventually goes to the door after the light turns on and asks production team members “Can you f— off for a second?” before he slams the door and holds it closed against the production team.
Video is blurred, but it’s clear Jones has no clothes on when he comes to the door.
He then puts a towel over his front before he leaves and locks himself in his own bedroom.
Scott alerted the ship’s captain, Jason Chambers, to the situation and opened up about her own history of sexual assault in an emotional on-camera moment. Chambers told Jones he had to leave for a hotel for the night, and Jones was terminated the next morning.
“We don’t actually know what would have happened, but being in her bed naked — and she’s got no idea — it actually makes my skin crawl,” Scott said during the episode. “You have no right to put someone unconscious into that position.”
Jones did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment Tuesday.
Fans who watched the episode, which streamed on Peacock, praised the actions of the production team and the crew. Some also said they believed their intervention thwarted a potential sexual assault.
“The #BelowDeckDownUnder producers, Captain Jason, and Aesha gave A MASTERCLASS on prioritizing the safety of employees above everything. Hats off to them,” a viewer tweeted.
The rest of the episode handles the fallout from the incident, including a touching moment when Sisson is consoled by two other women and assured she is not to blame for what happened.
“I feel, like, disappointed in myself,” Sisson said in a confessional. “I feel embarrassed, sad. I’m shocked, and I’m processing it, but I’m honestly, just, I just feel so loved. It’s a lot of different emotions at once.”
Chambers also met with the entire crew about Jones’ termination and said a “closed door” represents a boundary.
“Our cabin is our safety zone,” Chambers said. “That door is our boundary. That door is not to be opened unless it’s consensual. To walk into someone else’s room without consent, indecent, is my limit.”
Another member of the cast, Laura Bileskalne, was terminated after Chambers learned that she also made a colleague uncomfortable by entering his room and trying to give him a massage without his consent. Bileskalne also made comments to Sisson defending Jones, claiming he was most likely “only joking” and is a “sexual person.”
“There’s a big disconnect now, and it’s not where I want part of my team,” Chambers said. “You’ve actually disrespected what I set out to do.”
Bileskalne responded: “I understand what you said, and I’ll respect it.”
Chambers said moments before he fired her, “You didn’t show that.”
Representatives for Bravo did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Bravo is owned by NBCUniversal, the parent company of NBC News.
