Comedy Central rapped over 6.30pm broadcast

Comedy Central has been censured for showing an episode of Two And A Half Men with 'strong sexual themes' at 6.30pm.

A viewer complained to regulator Ofcom about the episode Four Balls, Two Bats and One Mitt, which was broadcast in December.

The plot revolved around Alan Harper, played by Jon Cryer, and his partner Lyndsey Mackelroy (Courtney Thorne-Smith) attempting to add excitement to their relationship by fulfilling their fantasies of a threesome.

During the episode Lyndsey promised to have a threesome with Alan and another woman of his choice, on condition that he agreed to fulfil her fantasy threesome, which would include Alan’s flatmate, Walden, played by Ashton Kutcher.

When approached by the watchdog, Comedy Central said it did not 'seek to defend the scheduling at 6:30pm' and apologised for this episode being broadcast at this time – which it blamed on an error when the programme was uploaded on to its play-out system even though the episode was labelled as 'not near kids'.

The broadcaster added that it had tightened up its procedures and as 'confident' that such an error wouldn't be repeated.

Ruling that the sitcom had breached the broadcasting code, Ofcom said: 'We took account of the facts that the material was not sexually explicit and was “humorous and light hearted".

'[But] the overall tone and sexual theme throughout, together with the cumulative impact of the sexual references and innuendos and the sequence of the characters in bed together, resulted in the material being inconsistent with audience expectations of the type of material to be broadcast on this channel at 18:30.

Viewing data suggested that 5,000 out of the 59,000 viewers of this programme were between 10 and 15 years old, with none aged four to nine.

Published: 6 May 2014