Fans flood TEN with Australian Survivor applications
Hunt is on for a cast and a mystery tropical location for upcoming TEN series.
- Published by David Knox
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Within just a week of announcing plans to produce Australian Survivor in 2016, TEN has been inundated with over 5000 applications.
“The reaction to the announcement has been fantastic,” Stephen Tate, TEN’s Head of Factual and Entertainment told TV Tonight.
“So it’s an indication that there’s a really strong fan base for it and the options that it will give us are incredible.
“I haven’t seen such a fast update on any show I’ve worked on, and I’ve done a lot of constructed reality programmes over the years.”
The casting notice is open to men and women over the age of 18, from all backgrounds and locations around Australia.
It will be produced by Endemol Shine Australia.
“Peter Newman will oversee it and Amilia Fisk is the EP who I did Bachelorette with, so it will be a great team.”
TEN is yet to confirm the destination for their series, but Tate confirms it will be an exotic overseas locale.
“I’m heading off overseas in a couple of weeks for some secret looks at potential locations,” he said.
“It’s really important that the location is both exotic and confronting for an Australian audience.
“We took I’m a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here in Africa when we could have made it in the English site here in Australia. We just felt Australian celebrities wouldn’t be afraid of the bush. It’s the same with Survivor, we really need to take people out of their comfort zone.”
Nine first produced an Australian Survivor in 2002 set in South Australia, while Seven mounted a Celebrity Survivor in Vanuatu in 2006.
“The Great Australian Bight wasn’t the best choice of location but I’ve got the benefit of that hindsight. It probably seemed like a great idea at the time,” Tate continued.
“Castaway, the format owners, are based in London and we’re getting benefit of 31 US series and all of the international series. One of the things they’ve said is the ocean is incredibly important and there should be at least one challenge in the water in every episode.”
If you can swim, you can still apply here.
14 Responses
I’m sure having castaway involved they will find the right people and location. If not already done they should have a consultant from the US version to stay true to the format. 31 seasons….. They are obviously doing something right.
I think a big decision will also be the host… Jeff really makes the show in the US (he is also producer)
As I realise my chances of being picked to be a castaway, I am happy to host and take the pressure of being Jeff. #StandinginforProbst
I hear Fiji is nice, convenient to get to from the east coast of Australia and lots of nice resorts for execs and sponsors to stay at We can rule out nearly all the other options immediately as Phuket and Maylasia (too crowded and wet season issues), Vanautu Solomon Islands and New Caledonia (too expensive), PNG (not safe enough and unattractive to visiting execs), Bali (too crowded and overexposed over-boganized already) and New Zealand (too cold and windy for a winter shoot).
It’s Australian Survivor yet we still feel we must shoot it OS ? The cultural cringe is alive and well. Surely there are enough locations in Australia that would be ” outside the comfort zone ” of the contestants ? Oh , but if that was the case we couldn’t justify planeloads of executives going on high priced reccees could we ? Really what a joke and a waste of money , though I’m sure TEN will be paying through the nose for this. Sounds like another Big Adventure to me. And look how that ended. Tears all around. There’s a reason Survivor is not a prime time main channel proposition here anymore. TEN is setting itself up for another Renovators.
The U.S. version has never filmed at home, and the year Amazing Race tried that people hated it. Likening it to Renovators is also not fitting, that was a paper format that was stripped across the week, (as was Big Adventure) neither of which fits Survivor model.
(1) Big Adventure wasn’t stripped. (2) Having to deal with 40 contestants fighting for airtime when some of them had no discernable personalities was a bigger reason that US-based season of TAR failed. (3) The Mole. The Aussie, American, and British versions all had domestic and international seasons, and in all three cases the domestic seasons had the biggest audience (except for that revival). The location definitely plays a part, but making the season good is more important. You could probably do that better in NT or Qld than in a south Pacific island with less infrastructure to work with.
Agreed Big Adventure wasn’t stripped but it was a paper format. Likening two ambitious failures hardly the same as the ‘grand-daddy’ of all Reality shows.
The original Australian version on 9 filmed in Australia (30km out of Port Linchon) and it failed. Plus, depending on the location, it would be cheeper to film oversees (due to less restrictive labor laws). Also, it adds a bit of showmanship when they say “16 Australians are being taken to the exotic island of Palau (example location)” as opposed to “16 Australians are being taken to Walers Way (Location of 9’s Au Survivor) on the Great Australian Bite”.
My main concern is they will cast fame hungry wannabes and not real fans of the show, if they get the casting wrong the show will be a real flop, the current American season is fantastic, because even though it is returning players they are real students of the game and know how to play it….
Exactly my thoughts too. To be safe I feel like you and I should be the producers to get the people who are there to play the game, not just pretty faces.
Note that it seeks any age over 18, so reason to be optimistic.
So does Big Brother, and look how that turns out!
I am willing to argue that BB ends up that way because it’s a show in which the target demo is younger plus younger people can give up 100+ days easier then parents with families, work commitments. If you look at the cast for almost any season of Survivor (in which the average filming process takes 7 weeks), it tends to get a good even spread of ages.
That’s a good point. If they cast the sort of people that go on Big Brother for example, I think it would fail. The beauty of US Survivor and it’s casting is they get a good diversity of people, all ages and types unlike Big Brother which just goes for young and loud people. I do hope they get the casting right.