“Survivor: In The Hands of the Fans” is set to end on Wednesday night, celebrating its 25th anniversary milestone with a season full of returning fan-favorite contestants and never-before-seen twists.
However, according to longtime host and showrunner Jeff Probst, one thing that won’t be changing anytime soon is the CBS competition series’ location. Now on Season 50, “Survivor” has filmed at the Mamanuca Islands in Fiji since Season 33 in 2016, a departure from the many years spent traveling the world to dozens of exotic locations following the show’s debut in May 2000.
“The truth is, it’s a logistic issue; it’s not really a creative choice,” Probst told fans at an FYC event on the Paramount lot on Tuesday. “When we used to do ‘Survivor,’ you know, 20 years ago, there were all these islands we could go to and we would have a scouting team that would go off way in advance, and they’d go: ‘Well, next we can do Samoa, Philippines looks good, Cambodia has Angkor Wat.’ We would just have this list. We don’t have that anymore.”
“A lot of places, islands that were empty now have hotels on them because ‘Survivor’ brought a lot of awareness and tourism. There’s a lot of political unrest in place we don’t want to go to anymore. There’s the value of the dollar and how it stacks up in other countries. Weather is a real thing. We’ve evacuated twice in Fiji, but there are times when we’ve changed our whole shooting schedule,” he continued. “So, Fiji has actually saved ‘Survivor’ and our relationship with their government is amazing. All the land owners, where we stay, the islands we use … if that changed, we’d be back looking, desperately, for somewhere.”
The evening also featured a sneak peek of Wednesday night’s live finale set, complete with tree mail scrolls and hidden immunity idols for two lucky attendees, as well as contestant meet-and-greets, food, drinks and iconic challenges from the show.
The final five players — Aubry Bracco, Jonathan Young, Tiffany Ervin, Joe Hunter and Rizo Velovic — are set to battle it out to see who wins the title of Sole Survivor and the $2 million grand prize. All 24 all-star castaways are also in the running to receive the $100,000 Sia Fan-Favorite prize, as voted by viewers.
Season 51 is scheduled for this fall on CBS, with Season 52 to begin production within the next 10 days, Probst further teased. All 50 seasons are available to stream on Paramount+.
