It’s hard to change a game that’s been going on for 50 seasons.
In this installment of Making a Scene, the variety show on HBO Max, the team behind Season 50 of CBS’ Survivor comes together to break down that very moment. It was a coin toss created by YouTuber Mr. Beast (aka Jimmy Donaldson) in which the winning prize was doubled to $2 million.
After the Survivor 50 results were announced, winner Aubrey Bracco, host Jeff Probst, EP Matt Van Wagenen, and the coin toss himself, Rick Devens, explained the entire process from the time the opportunity was presented to the tense Tribal Council where the coin was tossed.
“Season 50 was in the hands of the fans,” Van Wagenen told Variety. “And someone who was a big fan of our show was Mr. Beast. We were trying to figure out something that felt very ‘Survivor’ but could also be a little bit Mr. Beast.”
After a little brainstorming, the “Survivor” team and Donaldson successfully flip a coin, but they know it has to be “do or die,” and Donaldson agrees to put in $1 million. The conditions were simple: If participants correctly flipped a coin, the prize would increase to $2 million. Otherwise, the amount will remain at 1 million and the contestant will return home as part of that night’s Tribal Council.
The castaways first learned of the twist at Tribal Council, after returning to camp and spending a full day debating what the twist was.
“A lot of us watched ‘The Beast Game’ and thought, ‘He likes to bribe people. He likes to offer money to get out of games,'” Devens says. “In hindsight, that seems completely against the spirit of ‘Survivor,’ because Jeff hates people who quit. We were all sitting there going, ‘How much does it cost to quit the game?'”
Deadly twists had also appeared in Seasons 41 and 42, but Probst wasn’t a fan of them, as the player’s fate was determined by chance. So they looped all the contestants through food auction challenges and letters from loved ones, making them all “accomplices” in the chaos that was about to ensue.
The coin itself was handcrafted by the on-site “Survivor” art department and features the MrBeast logo on one side and a mix of “Survivor” elements on the other. The lawyers test-flip the coin the night before Tribal Council, and during that process Probst noticed that the uneven ground could cause some problems. If the coin lands on the edge, you must instruct the player to toss it again. “The lawyer said, ‘There’s no re-contract. Our contract is a one-time contract,'” Probst recalled. She fled the set and returned after renegotiations, telling them there was no problem.
None of that came to fruition as Devens, who volunteered for a flip within seconds, landed the coin firmly on heads.
“I was convinced that if I could flip a coin, everything I called out would hit,” says Devens, who shocked Probst by volunteering so early. “I thought, ‘Guys, I’m going to have to convince someone to flip this coin,'” the host admitted.
Bracco considered flipping a coin, but “really listened to his gut and instincts” when giving Devens the go-ahead. “He just has magic,” she said, adding that she felt Devens was “born to flip this coin.”
I was especially nervous at the production site. What if the camera didn’t catch the flip?
“I knew I couldn’t miss this,” Van Wagenen said. Additionally, Tribal Council is pitch black. There are no big lights, just a fire. Normally, the team would just bring an extra cameraman to the final tribal council, but they brought in a cinematographer to shoot close-ups and had several special cameras, including a handheld camera whose sole job was to “follow that coin.”
“It was the most cinematic flip ever. Even if I tried 50 times, I couldn’t do it again,” says Devens, who remembers everyone’s expectant looks as the coin rolled on the floor.
Unseen by the audience, fellow contestant Ozzie Russ was the first to jump up from his seat on the bench and yell, “Head!”, which Devens called.
For Probst, holding up the coin and showing the camera which side it fell on was an “indescribable moment.” “In a way, it felt inevitable. We’ve put a lot of time, energy, love and thought into this season…this has to land on the side he called.”
Devens was given the coin at the season finale (after almost a year of asking) and carries it with him. “Even Aubrey, who has $2 million instead of $1 million, might think that’s her lucky coin,” he jokes. “But since she got the money, I’ll keep the coin.”
