Jeff Probst on What It Takes to Produce ‘Survivor’

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1:00Matt Belloni:This episode of The Town is presented by 20th Century Studios, Avatar, Fire, and Ash. Don't miss the movie Critics Are Raving is epic and exciting and gorgeous and heartbreaking and stands as one of the greatest films ever made. It's got incredible visuals, jaw-dropping action, and a cinematic achievement. Avatar, Fire, and Ash, now playing in theaters and now nominated for the Academy Awards for Best Visual Effects and Best Costume Design. It is Wednesday, February 11th. I'm old enough to remember where I was on August 23rd in the year 2000. The season finale of a new show called Survivor was watched live by 52 million people in the U.S.

1:38Matt Belloni:alone. Pretty amazing number these days. Survivor was a summer experiment for CBS. All the other networks had passed on the show. But a young producer named Mark Burnett got sponsors to essentially pay for it. Celeste Munez, the head of CBS, finally said yes. Became an absolute sensation, of course, and essentially created a genre of television. the reality competition show, with the weekly eliminations, the real people dropped into extraordinary situations, the mind games, physical challenges, the I'm not here to make friends, and other tropes that we see all over TV these days. Many of them go back to Survivor.

2:12Matt Belloni:But even then, I think very few people would have guessed that the show would still be a hit for CBS heading into its 50th season, which begins on February 25th. We're doing a series of preview specials beginning this week. they're doing a bunch of new things for the milestone season bringing back players and doing twists and designs voted on by the audience but I wanted to go behind the scenes on the show so there's really only one guy to do that with Jeff Probst he's been there since the beginnings, the host and since 2010 he's been host and executive producer and showrunner meaning he's involved in every aspect of the show from casting to twists to random emergencies on set of course the tribal councils Probst is an interesting guy always super smart about the business and savvy, in addition to being a five-time Emmy winner.

2:58Matt Belloni:So in the run-up to the 50th season, I asked him to come on The Town, take us behind the scenes, hopefully take a look at producer Craig's audition tape, finally. So today is Survivor at 50 seasons and the business of one of the most iconic shows in the history of TV. From The Ringer and Puck, I'm Matt Bellamy and this is The Town.

3:19Matt Belloni:Okay, we are here with Jeff Probst, who is the host, executive producer, showrunner, face of the Survivor franchise. Welcome, Jeff. Nice to be here with you, Matt. Big fan of your show. Well, that's very nice of you. I gotta say, I'm a little intimidated. You are pretty well known as one of the greatest interviewers in the history of television, I would say. Wait a second. I just have to take this in. The guy with the most attitude in Hollywood is intimidated at all? I am a little bit. I mean, you like I mean, I guess you're underrated. It's hard to say you're underrated because you've been on television doing the top rated show for 25 years.

4:00Matt Belloni:But you are extremely good at asking questions and teasing out what you need out of your interviews on Survivor. And I think that's one of the many reasons why that show has endured, because I got to be honest with you. I was among the first group of viewers of the show. I remember it very clearly. My law school buddies and I were like, what is this? And we started watching in the summer of 2000. And if you had told me then that this show would, first of all, justify two cycles a year. I know it was very controversial when CBS decided to do that because American Idol was not doing that at the time.

4:41Matt Belloni:And if you had said that this was going to last 50 seasons, I would have said, absolutely no way. People will get tired of it. Well, I remember the first review I read, which said, really interesting concept. The only problem is the host. The Rock and Roll Jeopardy guy. Yeah. And I was like, oh, my God, I'm the only problem with the show. Everything else is interesting. They could have Dunkelman'd you. Oh, don't even say that. Don't say it. My life would be so different. I know. They could have Brian Dunkelman'd you. Yeah, this was the best thing that ever happened to me. So yeah, I hear you. I don't think anybody could have ever predicted this kind of run.

5:18There's just no way. You keep your head down and you go one season at a time and you look up and suddenly it's 25 years. I know.

5:25Matt Belloni:It's amazing. If you had to give advice to your season one self after having done 50 seasons of this, what would it be? Do the same thing. Because there's a lot of stuff from like that first season, for instance, that I could cringe at if I were going to be critical. What makes you cringe when you look back? I'll tell you, the big idea we talked about a lot was let's create our own world, our own vernacular. Things like the tribe has spoken and tribal council, castaways, tribe mates, not players in competitions. And so with that came a lot of mythology. Like when the players walked into tribal council, Mark really wanted to have a barrel, a treasure chest full of money.

6:08And we didn't like, most of us didn't like it. We thought it was corny, but Mark said, I never want them to forget you were actually playing for$1 million. So he had a really strong point of view. We also had a gong. When you walked in, you had to hit the gong. It seemed corny at the time, but it was part of a ritual. We wanted you to feel like you were the last to the party. We've been here for a thousand years. And we did a conch shell that season where you had to have the shell before you could talk. A lot of those ideas didn't work. But the reason I would say do the same thing is Mark was really generous in saying, just try things and let's see what's working.

6:42Matt Belloni:It's really hard to explain to people now who, you know, like Craig or others who maybe weren't watching or even alive at the time that how famous these castaways became because a friend of mine I was living in LA at the time a friend of mine was actually dating Colleen from that first season and it was crazy because we would go out and just over that summer it it became like she couldn't even go anywhere because people would come up and say oh my god and it was the first real time that regular people had been thrust into this kind of stardom via a competition show. Now, it's obvious. Everybody knows these people, your favorite reality star, but it's not the same as when 50 million people are watching the finale of a show and there's nothing else like it on television.

7:32Well, I had a really interesting vantage point because I was not talked about. Nobody knew who I was. No stories were done about me. It was about the players. But I was often around because we'd be at an event or a press situation. So I could watch what you're talking about. I went to the Super Bowl with Richard Hatch after the first season ended. And it was to promote our second season. And every two steps we walked, it was Richard, Richard, Hatch. Everybody in the stadium knew Richard Hatch. And then, Matt, for season two, everybody was aware of Survivor. And it premiered to like 45 million people after the Super Bowl.

8:14And now you got Colby and Elizabeth Hasselbeck and all of these people that were instantly thrust into the spotlight. Not a slow burn like the first season.

8:22Matt Belloni:At least they knew what they were getting into. I think for some of these first season people, it was quite a rude awakening. Absolutely. I mean, that is whiplash, especially with Survivor. because as you said, 50 million, I have a Hollywood Reporter cover that says 72 million people watched part of that finale. Oh my God. That's a lot of awareness for somebody who was a truck driver from Wisconsin six weeks ago. All right. So I want to talk a little bit about your role as showrunner. I mean, everyone knows you're the host. Everyone knows what you do on camera. But since, what was it, the 2010 season?

8:56Matt Belloni:What was the season that you took over from Bernie? Yeah, I think that's right. You are the showrunner, meaning you are involved in every aspect from the casting to the twists that they do on the show to everything that we see. So how is the show different under you as showrunner than it maybe was under Mark Burnett? That's a really interesting way to ask that question because so much of Survivor is based on the point of view of the person who's leading the creative and leading the team. And so I did have a different angle I wanted to take. And that was number one, I wanted to make Survivor a family show.

9:34And I knew what that meant to me. It meant the type of people we put on, the type of stories we focus on. I also wanted to make it even more cinematic. It was already cinematic, but we've taken it to another level. And we've spent a lot of time on lenses and time of day and how we're going to shoot things. And then the other was that I wanted to really take on the Joseph Campbell idea of this hero's journey and design a game that is the lure. The game of Survivor is deliciously fun to lie, to see, you know, all that stuff. But the trick, I think, is the game is the MacGuffin. You play the game because it's fun, but the experience you get is what changes you.

10:14And so I'm very much about that. Everybody on our show knows we think of our show in stages and they relate to Joseph Campbell and it's very nerdy and deep, But that's what's keeping our engine fueling.

10:26Matt Belloni:And how did you make it more family? Because it's funny you say that. I remember back in the beginning, there was a lot of debate about whether this was a show you should watch with your children because of the lying and deceit. Now it seems kind of quaint within the culture. I mean, you've got like the president openly lying. But how did you change that? Well, I think you hit on something with the game because I think in the beginning, the players were sort of teaching us what this format was going to be. and a lot of things became personal. Once we started adding more game design, it freed the people up to play.

10:58It is a game. So lying is one of the tenets of the game. So you're okay to do that. The other thing is you look at our casting now, the type of people we put on the show tend to be people you want to root for. Not always, but we're not putting people on that you just don't like at all. And then I think the other is the type of stories you tell. I have a much more playful sense now. I love Survivor. I love having fun. I love making dumb comments. I think of kids, Matt, constantly. And again, our crew knows it's 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11-year-olds. That's who I'm trying to get to to say, you could do this.

11:34You get that imagination going. And when I meet them on the street, and I meet them all the time, I ask them, do you think you could make fire? Yes. Do you think you could sleep in the jungle? Yes. They're already thinking about it.

11:45Matt Belloni:Craig really wants to be on the show. We'll talk about that after. But it's been a lifelong dream. I'm sure you get that all the time. Well, we'll find out if Craig has even applied. That's true. Okay. How do you prepare yourself for these tribal council discussions? Like, do you consult with the contestants and say, I'm going to go here, here, here? Do you prefer to surprise them? Do you psych yourself up? You sort of have to be a quasi-psychologist on this show. And how do you prepare? Well, there's no interaction with the players like what you just suggested. There would never be me saying, hey, here's what we're going to talk about tonight.

12:19that's part of it. This sounds crazy, but I really, here's what I know going into tribal. I know who we think is going home. It doesn't mean they are going to go home because we have these live tribals where sometimes things change, but I have a basic idea. And I also know all the critical information who has any kind of an advantage or a twist that might come into the game. So I'm prepared for which direction it might go. But the truth, Matt, this is the absolute truth, I just walk in and I start asking questions and they're not that complicated. It's just trying to read the group and see where, like you can feel tension.

12:57Sometimes they walk in and I can tell, oh man, they are in a mood. Other times they're walking in laughing. So you go in that direction, but there's no big science. I don't have cue cards or cheat sheets or anybody in my ear. It is an improv for sure.

13:11Matt Belloni:And it's probably a lot easier as a production now that you have a home base in Fiji. Jumping around the world like you did in those early seasons had to be a huge pain in the ass. Now you know the environment you're dealing with. You know how to shoot it. You've got your people. You know the angles. It must just be a lot easier that way. Were you in support of that, Jeff? Or is that something you didn't want to do, permanently move to Fiji? Well, no. Actually, Craig, it was a lifesaver. Here's what happened is as the years went on, it used to be we could go all over the world and find small islands and then places where we could stay, either build a tent city where we all live in tents or some temporary housing.

13:51But as the years went on, a few factors happened, population growth. A lot of the places that we shot in the past now have hotels on them. The second was the weather. It is changing. And places we used to be able to shoot now have such tremendous storms. In fact, even in Fiji, we've evacuated twice because of high cyclones. And the other was political unrest. There are now countries we simply can't and wouldn't go to. And the last one is the dollar, the falling dollar, the value overseas. So when we went to Fiji like 10 years ago, I met with the AG and said, here's the deal. If you will pay the rebate, because they give us a rebate, but you never know if they're going to pay it.

14:34They're an island nation. I mean, what are you going to do? I said, if you pay the rebate, we will make survivors synonymous with feeding and we'll work with your tourism board and we'll make this a win-win and it has been

14:44Matt Belloni:an unbelievable partnership what is the season of survivor cost to produce now well i can't give you the numbers but you can give me a you can give me a ballpark i'll tell you this here's how i'll answer it our budget has not gone down but where you have to be adaptable is your costs still go up crew members get raises format fees go up and so well the probes fee better be going up or I'm going to talk to your reps. You got a little leverage there, be the face of the show. You know, it's funny you say that. That was the hiccup when Mark wanted to make me showrunner and he went to CBS. They said, you're going to give that much leverage.

15:23You're going to let the guy be the face and let the guy be behind the camera. And Mark said, I trust Probst and I have never used it as leverage. I'm grateful for it. But it's funny you say that. Anyway, about the budget, here's what I was going to tell you. The budget stays the same, but your costs go up, so you have to adapt. So one thing we did is when COVID hit, we couldn't do our regular 39-day season and then do another 39-day season. Because with the quarantines, we would have been out there like 150 days. And it was untenable. So we sat down and said, how many days do we really need to do this show?

15:53We came up with 26 days. That's one-third less. and I had a few people tell me you were going to destroy the format because you can't steal a third of the production days and still deliver the same 13 episodes, 16 hours to CBS. But we thought we had a handle on it and we did and we have done that. And then Matt, we went from 60 minutes to 90 minute episodes. So we've actually cut one third of our shooting and deliver one third more product.

16:25Matt Belloni:Yeah, I saw some grumbling online from fans about the shortened seasons, but you know what? They still watch. Yeah, and fans, the hard thing with Survivor fans is they're so passionate, but they don't always have all the information. There's a lot of factors that go into making this show, and ultimately, I hope they trust us, but I don't think we're ever going back to 39 days. What's the most difficult conversation you've ever had with a CBS executive about the show? Wow.

16:53Really, that's such a... Good question. I'll tell you. Years ago, I was not allowed to talk to marketing at all. And I did not understand it. I'm the showrunner. I just shot the show. I know what the show is about. Why don't we dovetail your ideas with what really happened? And I was told, church and state, brother, thank you. Stay away. Very frustrating for me. It made no sense. Now with Amy Reisenbach and Mike Benson, I mean, it's a whole new thing. And I'm a collaborator. We're collaborators. We text with ideas all the time. And that's feels great. I can't believe the relationship I have. But yeah, if you talk about like some triggers, it would be in the past where I felt like they just wanted us to make the show and go away.

17:38And it felt weird to me to not be partners.

17:40Matt Belloni:Well, and you've had some situations that have come up where, you know, contestants being creepy, or you have to have standards intervene, or there's, you know, weather or things like that just come from doing a show like this. Yeah. Oh, yeah. I mean, really, if you look at the 750 or whatever episodes we've done, we've had very few situations. But what I like about our show and our commitment is we show it. We show it exactly as it happened. We put it right out there and we try to do it in a way where families can talk about it. And this is something I hear from parents all the time. They will say what you just said, Matt, and they'll say, you know, every so often a topic it comes up.

18:18It could be about race. It could be about gender. It could be whatever. We talk about it. And then you can talk to your kids and say, how would you handle that if somebody did that to you? We had a guy out this guy, Zeke, as being transgender. It was a horrible thing to do. But the guy, Zeke, who it happened to handled it so beautifully. He was so composed that he turned it into this incredible teaching moment.

18:42Matt Belloni:Well, don't you cast people like that, knowing that it could come up? I mean, I used to talk to John Murray on The Real World where they would cast people knowing that it would become part of their storyline, the coming out or the revelation of some dark secret or something. No, here's what we tell every player. You can ask any player. And we said it was Zeke. Your story is yours to tell. If you want to talk about it, if you want to come out, if this is the time you want to let your family know that you're gay, that's all for you. We never would have brought it up to Zeke. And Matt, we didn't.

19:15This was his second season play and it was near the end of the season. And this other player was desperate and made a really unfortunate decision. But we would have never brought it up. That's one of the things that's fun about this show is it's not scripted. It's not loosely scripted. It's not loosely suggested. We just watch. The format does the work. We stay out of the way. You go write the show and then we'll deliver it to the audience.

19:40Matt Belloni:So you must watch a lot of the knockoffs, you know, the shows that try to take elements of Survivor or blatantly copy Survivor. Why don't those shows work? Why has Survivor... I know you're going to say it's better produced and, you know, you're going to say that it's, you know, there's something about the rigor that you guys bring to it. But at this point, 25 years into this, you'd think that one of these shows would hit. You know, idle walk so that the voice could run. Where is the voice of the Survivor format? Yeah, it's a really good question. I don't know that I have a good answer I mean maybe stuff like The Traitors I mean all these shows owe Survivor a debt for the entire elimination concept and the I'm not here to make friends and the kind of modern weekly elimination that we know owes a lot to Survivor but there's never been something like Survivor that has hit the same way I don't know I can tell you what I think I think the format you may think this is corny I think one of the things that's unique about Survivor is the format speaks to us.

20:43It speaks to something. There are lots of fun shows. There is no show adventure like Survivor where you take a group of strangers and you literally leave them alone in a jungle and you say, no supplies, good luck. By the way, every few days, you're gonna have to vote somebody out. And in the end, all those people you voted out, they'll decide who wins. Good luck, see you later. There's no show like that. There's nowhere to hide. You are stripped of everything. And I think at its core, that's why I was leaning into Joseph Campbell so much. I do think there's something a little bit spiritual about Survivor when you get into it.