Spoiler alert: Jeff Probst accidentally unveiled the loser — and as a result, the winner — of a key challenge during the finale of Survivor 50 before the segment had a chance to air.
After Aubry Bracco won the immunity challenge during Wednesday evening’s finale, Bracco picked Rizo Velovic and Jonathan Young to hash it out in a fire-making competition. When CBS cut to Probst in front of a live audience in Los Angeles, the host appeared to mix up the production cues and mistakenly brought out Velovic onstage, announcing him as the loser before the challenge — which decides who makes it to the final three — had been broadcast.
As Probst invited Velovic to join the Season 50 jury, he quickly realized something was amiss as the audience gasped and
the show cut to commercial. When the cameras were once again rolling, Probst, now fully informed on what went awry, declared: “I love live television.”
Joking about the spoiler, Probst said, “We were supposed to show you fire-making, and then have the loser of fire-making, Rizo, come out and talk about how charming he is, and if how he had practiced fire-making, maybe he would have won. Instead, we did a Survivor twist. It’s the last twist of the season.”
When speaking to Rolling Stone earlier this week, the longtime host discussed how working with musicians during his Sound FX days helped him during Survivor‘s live tapings. “What I learned from interviewing musicians is how to be in the moment,” he said. “[Survivor creator] Mark Burnett actually said to me when he hired me — he said, “I’m hiring you mainly for all the live television you’ve done, because Survivor is going to be a live show — live to tape, but it’s a live show. We don’t do retakes and all that stuff.” Those three years on FX were fundamental. I learned not to panic when things go haywire. To embrace the chaos.”
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