'Survivor' Host Jeff Probst's Favorite Memory From the Show
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The Emmy-winning host of CBS’ long-running series Survivor (Sept. 27 on CBS) returns for the 45th season of the competition, whose motto is “Outwit, Outplay, Outlast.” The new season of the complex social game, filmed in Fiji, will be expanding to 90 minutes as 18 new players will face one of the most intense versions of Survivor ever. In the end, only one will remain to claim the title of “Sole Survivor” and a $1 million prize.
Related: 'Survivor' Season 45: Everything We Know So Far (Including the Cast)
With Survivor starting its 45th season, do you think you’ve seen it all?
You would think that after 23 years I would say that I’ve seen it all, but I know I haven’t and it’s for one simple reason: people are unpredictable. When you put people in a crisis situation like Survivor, where you’re forced to survive in a real jungle while simultaneously conspiring against each other, it’s impossible to ever predict what any one person might do because every single person comes into the game from a very specific place.
Their upbringing has impacted things, their friendship circle, the success they’ve had in life, how they were parented—all of that makes each person unique.
This fall is going to be the fifth season of the “new era.” How does Survivor differ in the new era?
We had a big idea in mind when we decided to redesign the game [the new era is a 26-day game rather than the original 39-day] and it was that our long-term goal was to introduce so many new twists that players would be forced to live in a constant state of uncertainty. Now, we can begin to play on that uncertainty. Because once you establish the uncertainty, then just the possibility that there might be a new twist or an advantage is all you need.
Are there new twists for this season?
Not really anything we can tease. I don’t think I’ve figured out how to answer this question yet, but the big twist is that you don’t know what’s coming. In the past, up until we got to Survivor 40, the players had figured out a lot of the game and they could kind of tell you what they thought might happen. It’s going to be one of three or four things here, it’ll be one of these two things here, and we realized that. We realized that the players had taken over, they knew the game so well that we had to completely blow up the game and start over.
We tried to make the game so unpredictable that your only choice is to stop trying to figure it out.
How does the new 90-minute format change things?
The 90 minutes doesn’t affect the game at all, but the audience will see a huge difference in the depth and variety of the storytelling because 90 minutes allows us to show more reality scenes at their beaches. It allows us to show an “Immunity Idol” hunt, for instance, where we can take you much deeper into the hunt for the idol and the drama that comes with the discovery of an idol.
Why did you decide to also do a podcast, On Fire with Jeff Probst?
The podcast was designed specifically as a way to take fans deeper inside the making of the show. On Fire is not a recap podcast; rather, we explore the how and the why of the making of Survivor. And in the season we did, we shared a lot of our creative process, where we come up with ideas, how we execute them, how do we shoot the show, what cameras do we use? Here’s an example of a scene that you could edit three different ways with the same set of facts but get a different emotional result.
So, we took a very deep dive, and the one point we were really trying to make clear is that we never think our creative ideas are perfect or even the right idea, they’re just the ideas we thought might be fun to try.
It lets you give credit to the people behind the scenes who make it work, who create the challenges and who find the locations?
Yes, exactly. There’s a whole episode on how challenges are designed and then executed in the field, including a pretty detailed answer about how we build a challenge in the middle of the ocean in a way that it is secure enough for humans to go run and jump off of things, but it still floats enough so that if a big storm comes in it won’t snap and float away. It takes a lot of engineering to make that happen for a challenge that you run one time in one season and then you take it apart and tear it down.
You’re the one constant. You’re the one person we see every single season. What makes you keep showing up?
I get a front-row seat to the thing I love the most, watching humans behave. I am endlessly fascinated by taking a group of people and putting them in a real crisis situation. Even though there are cameras there, there’s no help. You’re dropped in a jungle, and if you’re lucky, you’ll get a pot, a machete and a flint. If you’re unlucky, you won’t even have that, you will have nothing. How are you going to do night one, let alone night 25?
...And this is no exaggeration, I cannot believe that it’s what I get to do for a living. I can’t believe that the thing I love the most, I get paid to do. And I get to help design the game that’s going to take you on this crazy journey. And you’re going to have some very low lows and some big highs, but there’s one thing guaranteed, you will not be the same person when you’re finished.
Photo by Robert Voets/CBS via Getty Images)
It does change people’s lives. An example from early on is Boston Rob and Amber, who met and fell in love and had kids.
You look at Boston Rob and Amber...were they ever going to meet in normal life? And yet on Survivor, these two people came together and now have been together for like 20 years and have four beautiful girls. It’s amazing.
We tend to run in our little packs of friends that are like us and think like us and do the things we like to do. What’s really interesting about Survivor is ... you’re forced to accept differences, and instead of becoming adversaries, you’re forced to use those differences to make each of you stronger.
Related: Take a Deep Dive Into the Cast of 'Survivor' 45
I’m sure that’s true for the crew, too, not just cast members.
I’ll give you an interesting stat about our crew. When Mark Burnett had not been on location for years, for our 40th season, I begged him to come out and just be reminded of what he had created. So, he said, “All right, I’ll come back.” And he was there for a few days and as he left, we had made this giant banner, like 40 feet by 60 feet, and we went and put this banner on this bluff.
And what it said was: “20 years, 40 seasons, 60 babies.” Those 60 babies, which are now 68 babies, are babies that were made from people who met on Survivor. We’re at almost 70 children made from our crew, that blows my mind. It’s a testament that we’re one big family, we’ve been together so long.
How do you think you would fare if you were on the other side as a player? Do you have any game-winning tactics?
No, I think about this from time to time. Because the only advice I ever give to a player is that you have to play Survivor to win, which means you can’t play to not lose. So, the question I always ask myself is: Could I take my own advice and play risky? And when I’m really honest, I don’t know. Because it’s easy to say, “Play big,” but then you go, “God, if I’m wrong, I’m out and I want to be here another day.” But I still circle back to the same logic which is: Well, then you’re just a loser waiting to happen. So, I think ultimately when I sat with myself long enough, I’d say, “I have to make a big move, because it’s the only way to win and I didn’t come out here to lose.”
What are some of your favorite moments from the show?
I think if I had a favorite moment, it would be Cirie in the season we did called “Game Changers.” There’s a moment in a water challenge where Cirie can’t get up on a balance beam, and the challenge continues and her tribe loses, and the challenge is over. But instead of ending the challenge we say, “We’re not going anywhere.” And we trace her story back to when she first applied to be on the show and she said, “I told myself, I’m going to get up off the couch and quit watching Survivor and become a player on Survivor.”
And I said something about that to her while she’s in the water. I said, “Cirie, this is why you got up off the couch 12 years ago was for a moment like this. We got nothing but time, so let’s just stay with you.” It’s one of the most beautiful moments because her tribe rallies behind her, they help her get up on the platform and they wait until she crosses that balance beam. They had lost, it was insignificant in terms of the outcome, but it was incredibly significant in terms of Cirie and the inspiration she provided for people at home watching with the idea that if you don’t give up on yourself, what could you achieve?
That remains the defining moment for me of why I ultimately love Survivor, is that on any given day anything can happen, and you can amaze yourself. Cirie has never won Survivor, she never will, but she’s in the Survivor Hall of Fame and on every single Survivor fan’s Top 5 list of all-time favorite players because of moments like that.
You could say she really brings the heart to the show.
One hundred percent. But here’s the thing, she brings the heart to the show but that’s not all she brings. Because she had the courage to get up off the couch and come play Survivor, she learned something: I’m pretty likable, and I’m very social, and those two skills together opened the door to her to use her ultimate secret weapon, which is what you will never see coming—an incredibly savvy strategy.
And to this day, Cirie could come out and play Survivor again, and on day one everyone would say the same thing, “We must get rid of her immediately.” And the odds of her lasting deep in the game are very high because she’s just that good, you want her around. She’s likable and funny and charming, and what you always forget is she’s also so good strategically that she just voted me out and I didn’t see it coming. It’s an amazing quality. I love Cirie.
