Discovery Channel bares all with upcoming 'Naked' shows

The Discovery Channel is stripping survival down to its bare essentials.
The cable network known for hard-core documentaries will launch two new survival series in which the participants are dropped into some of the world’s most dangerous, remote locations — completely nude.
“Naked Castaway,” features survivalist Ed Stafford who lands naked and alone on a deserted island, southeast of Fiji, with only his brain, bare hands, and a camera to keep him alive for 60 days. He takes no food, water, clothes, knife or tools.
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It debuts April 14.
On “Naked and Afraid,” premiering this summer, two complete strangers — a man and a woman — meet for the first time while in the buff, surrounded by the wilderness and wild animals. The first episode takes place in Tanzania on the Serengeti plains.
“I’m an ultimate survivalist,” said the show’s star, Kellie Nightlinger, 38, who was starving after two weeks in the wild when she cooked up a scheme to use her ladyparts as bait to catch fish between her legs at a muddy watering hole.
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“We were very hungry and needed fish for our survival,” Nightlinger, a former gold miner in Alaska, told the Daily News. “We needed something with protein and because the water was so muddy, traditional fishing methods wouldn’t work, so I had to improvise, adapt and overcome.”
At night, she and her survival partner, E.J. Snyder, a retired Army vet turned survival instructor, used a fire — lit by rubbing sticks together — to keep hyenas at bay.
“They were frightening, but at least they seemed to be afraid of fire,” she said of the predators.
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Other episodes, with different couples have been filmed in Panama, Costa Rica, the Maldives and Borneo.
“I think the challenge brings out the very best and very worst,” said executive producer Steve Rankin from a hospital bed in Costa Rica where he was recovering Thursday after being bitten hours earlier by a venomous snake while working on the show.
“The idea here is to push the ball down the field,” said Discovery channel exec, Craig Coffman. “Survival shows are so common now that it’s gotten more and more difficult to convince the audience that what they’re watching is something extreme.
“Having no clothes just takes it to the next level. It’s the ultimate test and makes survival exponentially more difficult.”