Emily Atack hits back at vile trolls after receiving ‘sexually aggressive’ attention for stripping off naked in TV show

Emily Atack has hit back at online trolls after receiving negative attention from viewers of her new TV series, Rivals.

Rivals is a racy new series starring David Tennant, Katherine Parkinson, Danny Dyer, and Aidan Turner that launched on Disney Plus on Friday, October 18.

Based on the steamy Jilly Cooper novel of the same name, the show has been described as a ‘daft bonk fest’ that has fans completely and utterly obsessed with the new comedy-drama.

Emily, 34, plays Sarah Stratton in the series, a local MP’s wife who has a penchant for having affairs with men who work at the local TV station.

In one memorable scene, which also stars a fully starkers Alex Hassel with his penis completely out, Emily’s character was taking part in a bit of naked tennis.

The star covered herself with a strategically placed tennis racquet and tennis balls, and fans hailed the cheeky scene.

However, Emily has revealed that she has received rather a lot of ‘sexually aggressive’ comments and criticism from those who have watched this scene.

‘I knew something like that would happen, just not this quickly,’ she said in an interview with The Sunday Times.

‘I’m at work, I’m playing a part, that scene is integral to the book. I am exactly where I need to be.’

She added that she’s working and should be able to perform a scene like this without receiving horrific comments.

‘I can’t control people’s sexually aggressive behaviour, but I can continue with my campaigning and fighting for women’s freedom. I should be able to do a scene like this and not receive negative attention. The two should not go hand in hand,’ she said.

She then recalled an alarming anecdote: ‘A woman said to me on Instagram the other day, “Pick a lane. You can’t play a racy role like that and get your clothes off and expect not to get messages. Why would you take that role?”

‘And I wanted to say to her, “Are you telling me essentially to quit my job?” Why should I?

‘Women have to change their clothes; we have to change our routes home. I’m a professional. I’m never going to please everybody,’ she concluded.

Ahead of the release of the show, Emily told that she was delighted to take on this role and was so comfortable on set she would ‘relax with her knockers out’.

‘Sometimes you do become so relaxed that you are just sometimes sitting there with your knockers out, and you go, “Oh, right, okay, God, I’ve forgotten to put my robe on.”’

Speaking about the tennis scene she also commented: ‘I thought, “Oh God, am I gonna have to actually know how to play tennis?” Funny that was my worry, rather than the nudity.”‘

The star has received abuse since she first came to fame, starring in The Inbetweeners as Charlotte Hinchcliffe, the object of desire for every man in the series.

In 2020 she made a BBC documentary called Asking for It?, which highlighted the extent of the abuse she has received, and spoke about how abusers assume she wants to receive what they send her.

She also told The Times in 2023, that online abuse directed at her spiked during the lockdown.

‘It feels like sexual assault – and I have been sexually assaulted, so I know what that feels like. I feel like I’m being sexually assaulted hundreds of times a day.’

‘There were so many other things going on. People were dying. People were in care homes having to wave at loved ones through windows. I didn’t feel I could come out and say, “Can you stop sending me pictures of your dick?” So I bottled it up.’