HAVING been stripped, forced to eat dog food to prevent starvation and deprived of human contact for hundreds of days, Nasubi wished for death instead of another 24 hours in his hellish prison. But he was no inmate trapped in an Alcatraz-style lock-up, nor a soldier captured by an enemy. 8 Nasubi was the victim of reality TV show A Life In Prizes 8 Nude Nasubi in 1998 in a flat where he had to win prizes to survive Credit: Supplied 8 Documentary The Contestant (12A) is in cinemas nationwide on November 29 Credit: Supplied Nasubi was the victim of reality TV show A Life In Prizes, which at its 1998 peak pulled in more than 30million viewers a week in Japan.
Now a new movie documentary tells how the 22-year-old was placed into a studio flat without any personal possessions and challenged to live off whatever he could win from writing into magazine contests. He would only be released after earning one million yen of prizes — just over £5,000 based on 1998 prices — and firing off tens of thousands of entries. Aspiring comedian Nasubi had been unaware of what he was agreeing to and only surrendered his clothing under the assurance that the show would never make it to air.
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