The first winner of Tyra Banks’ America’s Next Top Model has recalled the dangerous filming conditions, including sleep deprivation and hunger, ahead of Netflix’s shocking documentary series about the show.
Adrian Curry, who won first place in the first cycle of the series in 2003, spoke exclusively to Page Six about his hellish on-set experience.
Curry recalled that while filming the CW series, produced by the Tyra Banks Company and Ken Mok’s 10×10 Entertainment, she was “starving all day” and wasn’t given food by production until “3 or 4 p.m.”
“I was so underweight when I was there,” she said. “We weren’t eating properly.”
Curry continued, “I guess I was hungry. When I got home[after the show]my grandma looked at me and said, ‘You look depressed, you look like a skeleton.'”
As more women were excluded, Curry recalled that the production team dismantled parts of the set and eventually closed off the kitchen so the models could not cook for themselves.
“We were starving every day. Wow. I’ve never been this hungry,” she said.
Curry, now 43, also claimed that she and the other contestants stayed up all night while filming the judging scenes.
“Due to deliberate sleep deprivation, we kept pooping until 2 a.m. and then woke up until 5:30 a.m. Like, there was a lot of stuff like that going on,” she claimed.
Curry claimed that producers engaged in “psychological warfare” during “on-the-spot interviews.”
“They’re asking you questions and planting seeds: ‘So do you think this chick has an eating disorder? Do you think so?’ They were openly flirting with you,” she said.
Curry pointed out that the “rules and regulations” in place today did not exist in the reality TV world at the time.
Banks claimed in the doc’s teaser that she and producers “kept pushing it” with each new cycle because viewers were “demanding” more drama from the show, but it’s unclear what kind of act Banks was referring to. The show ran for 24 seasons from 2003 to 2018.
Curry believes Banks is partly to blame for the on-set poisoning, but she also says fans are partly to blame.
“Since the ancient times of the abstract Mayans and even the ancient Romans, there have been bloodthirsty mobs within humanity. We love to see people suffer,” she said.
Curry has opened up about how her on-screen transformation left her permanently damaged after the judges told her to dress up for the show.
“My scalp was sore and irritated and my skin was rough all day,” Curry claimed, adding that she had “horrible” scars on her head due to poorly applied hair extensions.
Curry was afraid to talk about her pain. He was confident that if he sued, the judge would remove him.
“I had to pretend it wasn’t (painful) because they execute anyone who complains or defends themselves in any way on that show,” she claimed. “If you say something, you’re going to be the bad guy. So I’m like, ‘I just want to win money for my family. I’m just going to do it.’
When she finally took the braids off her head after the show ended, Curry said her hair was never the same.
“I had a mullet for about two years after ‘Top Model,’ because it just wouldn’t grow. I was like King Joe Dirt,” she said, referring to the title character in the 2001 comedy starring David Spade.
Curry advanced the theory that Banks was using the documentary as “damage control” and a “launching pad.”
“I don’t think I would be shocked at all if all of a sudden in a year they came out with a new politically correct ‘Top Model,'” she said. “Tyra Banks’ PR team was great because they made her wait long enough for all the heat to go away before she said anything.”
“She’s very smart,” Curry added. “This was all strategically planned. Tyra Banks is a powerhouse. She has a public relations team behind her. They’re not playing around.”
As Curry suspected, Banks hinted in the document that a new cycle of ANTM could be in the offing.
Still, Curry says he harbors no animosity toward Banks or the other judges and is moving on.
“I should be sitting here hating her, but I don’t,” she said. “I want to tell her that I forgive her. I’m so grateful for what I got. Thank you.”
She added, “But you know, I don’t trust her to take care of kittens or anything.”
Winning on “ANTM” was “the biggest thing” that happened to Curry in her life, she said. Curry, who now works as a representative for Avon, said she wouldn’t be where she is today without the show.
“I got the title, and I’m so grateful for it. I joke about it all the time. That’s all I really want from the show. I’m going to put it on my fucking king’s grave,” she said.
As for the models who took part in the documentary, Curry wants them to be honest and tell their side of the story.
“I care about these girls and I want their voices to be heard,” Curry said. “Would I be shocked if they weren’t manipulated? Yes. Would I be happy if they weren’t manipulated? Of course.”
Curry recalled that producers were editing the show’s footage to create a compelling story.
“It’s so edited out that I had to write it down in my diary to never forget what really happened, very Orwellian,” she said. “It wasn’t just ‘Top Model,’ it was the same on all the reality shows I was on.”
“The editing is terrible. That’s not happening.”
Curry appeared on a number of other reality shows after “ANTM,” including meeting her first husband, Christopher Knight, on Season 4 of VH1’s “The Surreal Life” in 2005.
That same year, the two co-starred in the show My Fair Brady, which was about their relationship. (Currie and Knight announced their separation in 2011, and she married her current husband Matthew Lord in 2018.)
As for why Curry would never participate in a documentary about the series, she told Us, “I’m happy, dude. And you know what makes me really unhappy? When I watch TV and I see interviews of myself being brutally murdered…”
“I don’t need that in my life anymore.”
Other models, including Cycle 9 contestant Sarah Hartshorne, have also come forward saying they were hungry and sleep deprived on set.
“The producers kept us in the dark about almost everything because they wanted to keep us on our toes,” Hartshorne claimed in Vice’s 2024 documentary “The Dark Side of Reality TV: America’s Next Top Model.”
“Better TV comes from us being confused, tired, stressed, sleep-deprived and hungry,” she added.
Cycle 17 contestant Angelia Preston also recalled not eating properly during filming, telling the Daily Mail in 2015 that she and other contestants were forced to film for 16 to 17 hours without food or water.
Preston sued Banks for $3 million in damages, including for failing to provide meals and breaks, for causing emotional distress, and for breach of contract.
The CW said Prestin’s accusations were “without merit” and denied her claims. Preston dropped the lawsuit in 2018 and told Bustle four years later, “I realized I wasn’t going to win.”
Banks addressed the backlash after several allegedly problematic moments on the show went viral on social media.
Banks wrote on Twitter in 2020, “I’ve seen posts about the insensitivity of past ANTM moments and I agree with you. In retrospect, those were really bad choices. Thank you for the honest feedback and sending you lots of love and virtual hugs ❤️.”
As critics continued to speak out online, Banks admitted that she made a mistake in her speech at the Essence Black Women in Hollywood Awards in March 2025.
“Did we get it right? Ridiculous. I made a stupid statement. But I refuse to leave my legacy on some things that were linked on the internet when the world was changing for 24 cycles,” she said.
Representatives for Banks, Netflix and Mok did not immediately respond to Page Six’s requests for comment.
Netflix’s “Reality Check: Inside America’s Next Top Model” is now available.
