‘Escort Boys’ Producer on Taking the Raunchy Comedy on ‘Darker’ Ground

After tackling gender power dynamics in the post #MeToo era, Prime Video‘s raunchy comedy series “Escort Boys” is returning for a second season that’s several shades darker and is world premiering today at Canneseries.

Adapted from the Israeli show “Johnny and the Knights of Galilee” (“Milk and Honey”) and directed by Ruben Alves, the half-hour comedy series portrays four young men who become escorts to make ends meet and save their family business in a picturesque town in Southern France.

Boldly addressing timely themes such as romantic love, female sexuality and toxic masculinity, Season 1 was a hit, even luring Wild Bunch TV which acquired international sales (to seasons 1 and 2), and France’s leading commercial channel TF1 which bought second-window rights.

Myriam Gharbi-de Vasselot at Mediawan-owned Oberkampf Productions ‘(“Les Papillons Noirs”) who produced the series with Charlotte Toledano-Detaille and RTL TVI, said Season 2 is taking a departure from the original format. “It’s a true creation,” she says, and one that reteams Alves with Yaël Lebrati (“Dear You”), joined by Louis Pénicaut (“Le Bureau des Legendes”).

Season 2 picks up six months after the end of Season 1 which saw the main characters deciding to stop escorting to start a hotel venture. “They’re forced back into it due to a failed hotel venture which turned into a fiasco: they were ripped off and faced subsequent debt, leading them to lose their domain,” says de Vasselot, who also previously produced a documentary about male escorts which Wild Bunch TV picked up alongside the first two seasons of “Escort Boys.”

“We’re going to look at the consequences and limitations of prostitution, since it’s a subject that can’t be taken lightly and that we’re treating as realistically as possible,” she says, adding that the plot will deal with the “sex addiction of one of its main characters,…