Uneasy yes. Tyson Apostol didn’t exactly jump at the chance to compete on The Challenge: USAThe brand new MTV reality contest, ‘, will air on CBS this Summer.
The four-time winner is still alive. Survivor player, who won season 27 of the long-running series, felt the paycheck was worth dealing with “s–theads I don’t care for,” he says.
“I didn’t want to do this at all,” he exclusively tells Us WeeklyIn an interview, which can be viewed above. “I’m just super chill. I hate people coming in and feeling like they’re entitled to win. The second the cards and chips aren’t in their favor, they wig the f–k out. I hate that type of person.”
Tyson says there were “a couple [people] on this season I was hesitant to work with because I know that they have that exact personality.” In fact, two of those names seem to be his fellow SurvivorWinners Sarah Lacina Ben Driebergen, both of whom have “anger management issues” according to him. They also “understand how dangerous I am,” he says, as they all played together on Survivor: Winners at War.
And even though Sarah, Ben and some of the other Survivors know Tyson’s reputation as a strategic, social and physical threat, he tells Use, “Enough people hadn’t seen me on TV, and that played in my favor a little bit. Some of these younger folks Big Brother kids probably hadn’t seen me. And Love Island people, I think they only watch their own Instagram Stories as entertainment.”
So, his plan going into the game was to work with “anybody I can manipulate, which was pretty much probably everybody,” adding, “My main goal when I go out is be as calm as I can initially. Don’t be seen scrambling too much and try to win everybody over good that you can.”
Tyson also intended to be a spectator to any drama, rather than an active participant. “One of the entertaining things about going on these shows is watching people mentally and emotionally spiral out of control,” he says. “I don’t do that. I’m very very chill and usually very reserved, even in moments of extreme intensity. If it doesn’t involve me, I like to sit back and eat popcorn and watch the fireworks.”
Tyson answers the question of whether he had fun filming this show. Use a simple, “No.”
The Challenge: USAPremieres on CBS Wednesday, July 6th at 9:05 p.m. ET/PT
