Baywatch Pulled Off an Impressive Prank With This Fake History of Its Color Palette [Video]

The color is as much an iconic part of the show as David Hasselhoff, Pamela Anderson or slow-motion sprints across the beach. Yet a video shared by the official Baywatch page on Facebook recently revealed that the show originally tested several other colors, even settling on blue for the swimsuits and life buoys—before making the last-minute decision to go with red instead.

One problem: The story’s totally bogus.

The video, which purports to show “never before seen footage” and pre-series photography, was actually one big exercise in color-corrected fakery from the team at Fremantle, the show’s production and distribution company.

The clip was created to highlight the show’s partnership with Pantone on a color called Baywatch Red and to mark the 30th anniversary of Baywatch’s debut in 1989.

In 2018, Fremantle remastered all episodes of the 11-season show, which has since been picked up by networks around the world and streaming services including Amazon Prime and …