Ellie Chadwick has gone into the new Love Island series with one artist already fixed in her head: Drake. The 24-year-old real estate videographer said she listened to the rapper’s three latest albums before heading into the villa because, for her, liking Drake is not negotiable.
That matters now because Love Island returns on Monday 1st June at 9pm on ITV2 and ITVX, bringing Ellie in as one of six girls looking for love. She said she wanted Drake’s music ready in her mind before the cameras started rolling, adding that she had to keep listening constantly so the songs were locked in up there and she would be “okay” if the subject came up.
Ellie was blunt about the standard she is bringing into the show. “You’ve got to like Drake,” she said, adding that good hygiene is also a requirement and that she hopes to meet someone tall, dark and handsome. She also said eye contact is a massive thing for her and that she has been told she holds really, really strong eye contact, a detail that gives a sharper sense of how quickly she will read someone across the villa.
The Drake test sits alongside a wider set of pre-villa non-negotiables that sound simple but are hard to fake on a dating show built on first impressions. Ellie’s tattoo preference and her emphasis on eye contact suggest she is looking for instant chemistry, but she also made clear that the conversation has to land as well. As she put it, if she can talk to someone about Drake, she will be fine.
There was one person she could not lean on before the series started. Ellie said she knows former Love Island contestant Paige Turley, but had to keep her casting secret, so Turley had no idea until everyone else did. Paige, who won Love Island in 2020, could not give her any advice before Ellie disappeared into the show’s bubble, and Ellie admitted it was the biggest secret she has ever had to keep because she loves to talk.
That leaves the first episode to answer the only question that really matters now: whether Ellie’s version of a good match exists in the villa at all. She has set the terms plainly enough. On Monday night, the show will tell us whether anyone can clear them.
