It's hard to imagine an edition of Survivor with more built-in appeal than Survivor: All-Stars, which premieres tomorrow on CBS following the Super Bowl. After all, this isn't a whole new cast viewers have to get to know, just the most compelling characters from the previous seven editions.
A preview reel shown to critics offered plenty of entertaining moments, including Survivor: Pulau Tiga star Rudy Boesch attempting to drink contaminated water that had not yet been boiled. She-devil Jerri Manthey (Survivor: The Australian Outback) claimed she'll keep her mouth shut this time.
It all begins with three teams - 18 contestants playing for the $1 million grand prize - on boats with military escorts cruising toward their temporary tropical home, which, like Survivor: Pearl Islands, is off the coast of Panama.
"In order to ensure top secrecy, we are under military escort," explains host Jeff Probst, who welcomes viewers at one point while clinging to the side of a helicopter as it makes a banking turn.
Why such cheesy theatrics? "We are a couple of drama queens," admitted Survivor executive producer Mark Burnett.
Probst said this edition of Survivor is the hardest since the one set in Africa. The castaways are left with only one machete per tribe and no matches for a fire, necessary not only for cooking but also for boiling water.
Picking the cast of Survivor: All-Stars was far less exacting than previous editions, Burnett said. Instead of winnowing down contestants over a three-day period, he just jotted down names of past players on a legal pad and cut his list from 24 to 18. Some are to be expected - every past winner but Brian Heidik from Survivor: Thailand and Vecepia Towery of Survivor: Marquesas is competing again - but others are less obvious, including Amber Brkich (Survivor: The Australian Outback), who was pretty invisible in her season compared to other contestants.
"I was pushing for her because we had 18 slots and you want to take some chances," Probst said. "She's probably the most naive person to ever play Survivor. And in the last 2 1/2 years, she's lived a lot of life. Has it changed her any?"
Burnett said two former players turned him down: Elisabeth Filarski (Survivor: The Australian Outback), who landed a job as a co-host on ABC's The View, and Colleen Haskell (Survivor: Pulau Tiga), who just wasn't interested.
Past winners may have a difficult time repeating their success, Burnett said. "If you're a winner and you're a threat, people target you and that's life."
Having played Survivor once before and watched the other editions, these repeat performers had a somewhat paranoid expectation of new twists, Burnett said. "It allowed us just to play pretty much the original game, and their own imaginations did them in."
The Block News Alliance consists of The Blade and the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Rob Owen is the TV editor for the Post-Gazette.
First Published January 31, 2004, 1:09 p.m.
