Jonathan LaPaglia on Australian Survivor’s toughest season yet

It’s Survivor as we’ve never seen it before – and host Jonathan LaPaglia says contestants had no idea what they were getting themselves in for.

It’s a distant memory now, but Jonathan LaPaglia seemed an unlikely pick, back when he was announced as the host of Australian Survivor in 2016.

The Aussie actor had carved out a successful career as a US leading man, with a long list of credits – but without much prior experience as a TV presenter. Would he jet in, deliver his lines, then fly back to Hollywood?

How wrong the doubters were. Longtime Survivor fan LaPaglia embraced the role from day one, putting in extra work before his hosting duties start (he’s been known to test out challenges before contestants compete on them) and well after they finished (weighing in on fan debates via Instagram as the season airs, offering up candid behind-the-scenes insights).

Jonathan LaPaglia’s hosting Australian Survivor from the Aussie outback this year.

This year, hosting duties have taken him not to tropical Fiji or Samoa, but to the unforgiving Australian outback. It’s here, somewhere about 120 km east of remote Mount Isa, that we sit under a tent during a break in filming, batting away flies every few seconds. No airconditioned star trailer here – ‘JLP’ mucks in with the rest of the crew, a mammoth team who’ve taken over the nearby town of Cloncurry while Australian Survivor: Brains V Brawn films.

Earlier in the day, I’d watched this year’s contestants in the flesh from afar as their tribes merged, a significant mid-season milestone. I’m not spoiling anything when I tell you: They looked rough. Weather-beaten, hungry, and with a layer of dust and dirt they’ll probably still be scrubbing off in a year’s time: as LaPaglia explains, all the hype about this being the “toughest season ever” is more than justified.

Did the contestants know going in that they were facing a vastly different season this time around?

Well, because of Covid we had to shift locations – it was just too difficult to get back to Fiji, where we were already established. So they did let (the contestants) know that it was going to be in the Outback, but I don’t think you really appreciate how difficult it is unless you’ve had experience out in the Outback. So I think for a lot of them – like me, the city slickers – it was a shock. God, yeah.

It’s pretty inhospitable out here. The temperatures are extreme.

It’s a really intense heat – it’s weird. It just builds through the day. Normally back in Sydney or anywhere else, it’ll peak in the middle of the day and then start to tail off, but here it just keeps ramping up all the way through sunset and then stays at 35 degrees for a couple of hours after the sun has set. Personally I’ve found that the heat unbelievably intense; just an hour or two out there doing a challenge and I’m completely wasted. It’s crazy.

How do you think that the contestants are holding up?

I just think the conditions are more difficult. This season you’ve got the heat for the day and now we’re getting into this phase where it’s cold at night, much colder than a tropical location like Fiji.

The other issue that they’re facing is that there’s not much in the way of food available, like there is in Fiji: There are no coconuts, there are no bananas, there are no papayas. It’s easier to fish when you’re near the ocean. They’ve been catching yabbies!

I think it has really added a new element to this game. It’s already difficult as it is. Then you ramp up the conditions and I think some of them initially were like, ‘Wow, what did we sign up for?’

LaPaglia and friend on set.

And that’s before we even get to the animals. There are some threats out here you wouldn’t have had to deal with in Fiji.

No … we’ve got some really dangerous snakes out here, and they’re everywhere. So we have people going around trying to, trying to find them, but it’s basically taking a stick and poking it into crevices and hoping for the best. And so the contestants are up against that. They’re up against insects and deadly spiders. There are crocodiles in the dam. We do challenges in that dam!

Wait – are there actually crocodiles in a dam you send the contestants into?

Well, they’re freshwater crocodiles. So allegedly they’ll leave you alone, but then … there’s still a crocodile in there!

So much of Survivor is about sneaking off into the bushes to make plans with people – this season, some of these contestants must not really want to go poking around in the bush.

No, they don’t. So how do you strategise without the rest of your tribe seeing you? And I think they’ve done the best they can with the camp locations to give them those opportunities, but it’s still not as easy to do as it was in Fiji.

RELATED: Survivor’s full Brains V Brawn cast revealed

This year’s cast. Oh sure, it’s all smiles on day one …

We’re racking up a long list of disadvantages for this year’s contestants! Is there any advantage to them playing on home turf?

They’re all excited to be doing first season of Australian Survivor in Australia. Certainly as a crew, we’re all excited to do that. But I don’t know if there’s any advantage for the contestants at all (laughs). I think it’s definitely tougher, definitely tougher.

How does the Brains V Brawn element come into play? Brawn seems to have been overly prized in previous seasons of Australian Survivor.

Previous seasons have had a little too much emphasis on brawn in the challenges – the consequence of that is you lose some of those physically weaker players who may be more interesting strategically. So this year, I think they’ve tried to address that, and there are elements within the challenges that will favour the brain.

But then there’s the social game – and in many ways, I think that’s more important than either brawn or brains. You need a bit of everything to get through to the end, right?

For LaPaglia, hosting duties don’t stop at tribal council. Picture: Channel 10

You’re a very hands-on host: When controversies have arisen in the past, you’ve been there on social media giving viewers very honest commentary about the show. Is that all part of the job for you?

Yeah. Look, I really am invested in the show. I love the format. I love the show and I love going on a journey with these contestants, this group of strangers who come together. I wear a bunch of different hats: I’m a coach, I’m a therapist and I’m a referee, and it’s just fun watching them evolve. And I do feel invested and I do put a lot into it, because I feel the more I’m invested, the more I’m connected with the contestants. And then the more they feel at ease with me and the better I am, the better they will be. And the better it will be for the show.

Australian Survivor: Brains V Brawn premieres this Sunday July 18, 7:30pm on Ten.

The journalist travelled to Cloncurry as a guest of Network Ten.