A golf cart pulled up carrying another tall, stubbled Australian: Jensen’s brother Zach, who co-leads the art department. “He got me a job as an extra in ‘Star Wars,’ so I got him a job on ‘Survivor,’ ” Jesse Jensen said. “We were Jedis in ‘Attack of the Clones.’ ”
On the ride to the next stop, in an open-topped truck, fans traded stories. “We watched all of ‘Cagayan’ in a day,” Anna Veire, a twenty-three-year-old Iowa State grad, said, of her dorm floor.
“It was like ‘Survivor’ school,” Charlene Baes, the winner who’d invited her, added.
Jake and Kaylee Ben-Ami, newlyweds from Brooklyn, met when they were remote colleagues at an H.R.-software company. They shared Wednesday nights watching “Survivor” before they shared a Zip Code. “I mailed Jake a ‘Survivor’ candle as a thank-you for being my onboarding buddy,” Kaylee said.
Zimmerman listened, nodding. “It’s funny how you mark time by the show,” he said. He explained how it had helped him when his wife was undergoing cancer treatments: “The weird thing about cancer is, people don’t know what to say to you. But some knew I liked ‘Survivor.’ So they could ask about that.”
The chatter thinned as the truck halted at Tribal Council, the show’s main gathering spot. It was midday. The torches were cold, the fire pit was empty, and the set, newly built for Season 50, was bigger and deeper in the jungle than in the previous seasons. Seventy-four phoenix statues stood sentinel. “It’s all about rebirth,” Zach Jensen explained. One fan knelt to stroke the prop grass.
Jeff Probst emerged from a marble labyrinth, arms aloft, dimples twinkling. “Welcome to Tribal Council,” he said. Even in off-camera clothes (black T-shirt, gray shorts, sneakers), he had a powerful presence, scanning each face before he spoke again. He laughed. “So far, the players have been awestruck when they walk in,” he said. “Kind of like you are. But it’s tempered quickly when we sit down and I say, ‘But it’s going to be the death of one of you tonight.’ ”
That gut drop came for the contest winners at the final stop, the “Survivor” challenge field. The group had just polished off a big buffet lunch, but the afternoon was about to take a Darwinian turn.
“There’s no obligation to run, no embarrassment here,” Probst told them, sounding more like a hostage negotiator than a host. “You’re not playing for a million dollars.” Still, small talk stopped and hands went clammy. They hadn’t realized that they were to serve as dress-rehearsal stand-ins for the Season 50 contestants.
In short order, directed by Probst, the visitors were wobbling on giant balance beams, a couple of feet above the ground, each holding a ten-foot pole aloft, fighting to keep giant Ping-Pong balls from falling off the ends. One by one, the poles dropped. Among agonized grunts and huffs, Probst narrated the fumbles. Then he boomed,“We’ve got a winner!”
It was Jasmine Bacchus, the Brown grad who’d missed her chance years ago, now a second-year J.D. and M.B.A. student at Harvard. Still locked in endurance-challenge pose, pole in the air, she had not heard Probst. Finally, he whispered at her back, “It’s you.” Her pole dropped; tears flowed. The moment played just as in an episode of the show. Probst stood still, arms folded, knowing that his job, in moments like these, is simply not to step on them. ♦