ITV drops show that pits elephant against 44 dwarfs

A British version of a reality television show featuring 44 dwarfs competing against an elephant in a tug-of-war contest has been pulled before broadcast after protests by Dame Judi Dench and animal rights activists.

The decision by ITV1 to drop Man Versus Beast from a prime-time slot in tomorrow's evening schedule is a blow to the former footballer John Fashanu, who was to present the programme.

Mr Fashanu had boasted that the show would be "enormous", despite concerns that the original American version provoked outrage for pitting humans against animals in a series of physical tasks. The US show featured a sumo wrestler competing with an orang-utan in a nappy, a sprinter racing a giraffe and a chimpanzee taking part in an assault course.

Yesterday, Mr Fashanu, who was nicknamed Fash The Bash for his combative style of play, was licking his wounds after getting into a bear-fight with the Born Free Foundation. The animal welfare charity headed a campaign against the show that led to Granada Television being bombarded with protest letters.

ITV1 has replaced the programme with a less controversial offering, The Best Ever Magic Tricks.

An ITV1 spokeswoman denied that Man Versus Beasts was offensive or cruel to animals and said the dropping of the show was a "scheduling decision". Granada had billed the programme as the "ultimate physical challenge".

Mr Fashanu had predicted ratings for the show would "go through the roof", but he did not account for the wrath of some of Britain's most distinguished actresses. Virginia McKenna, founder of Born Free, said the show amounted to "degrading trivia.It is degrading for the animals, insulting to our intelligence and a disaster for any chance of increased respect for the animals we share the world with." Her fellow actress Jenny Seagrove said Granada had "cast aside compassion" and Dame Judi said she was "horrified".

Born Free promised to keep up its campaign yesterday after ITV1 said it intended to screen the show at a later date.

Daniel Taylor, a spokesman for the foundation, said: "This is a step in the right direction. A victory would be if they admitted that they had taken it off the schedule because of public pressure. I am encouraging members of the public to keep writing to ITV and Granada."

Mr Fashanu, a presenter of the 1990s hit series Gladiators, has had a rollercoaster year trying to revive his television career. The former Wimbledon striker appeared on the Granada-made reality show I'm a Celebrity ... Get Me Out of Here!, placing second in the Australian outback-based celebrity challenge. But Mr Fashanu was back in the headlines for the wrong reasons during the summer when a Sunday newspaper accused him of match-fixing. He denied the allegations.