Survivor 3’s Lex Discusses the Game, His Image, and His Kids

Lex van Den Berghe – the Survivor villain, the psycho tattooed guy from Santa Cruz, California, who threatened to slit the throat of anyone who got in his way – is really not psycho and thought everyone who was watching the game knew that it was a game. It was not a walk in the park, it was not high tea at a lovely little bistro with the best scones and a fine selection of sherry. It was a cut-throat game where the prize was a million bucks and everything said and done in that game stayed in the game.

When I play monopoly, I don't really expect you to pay me $1200 for landing on Boardwalk when I have a hotel. In fact, I don't really own Boardwalk. I don't even own a hotel or for that matter a house and I don't get around town in my pewter shoe car with no wheels. If I hide my cash under my ass because you keep asking for a loan, it does not mean that if you got arrested for not paying your rent in real life that I would not bail you out. Maybe those of us who got so caught up in the game of Survivor that we began to forget it's a game are the true imbalanced ones. After all, if you really bombed my house because I sank your battleship, you would probably get locked away – if not in a nut house, at least in jail. When Lex was saying, "I want to slit throats," he was really saying, "I want to sink your battleships."

I had the opportunity to chat with Lex. There are some similarities between the Lex I spoke with on the phone and the Lex showed on Survivor. Namely, he is intense. I remember watching the show thinking about how I, as a viewer, tended to hang on every word he said. He spoke with such assuredness and confidence. He still has that confidence, but Lex is probably one of the least psychotic people I have ever talked to in my life.

First of all, there are certain things about Lex that have not been blasted all over the place and one of them changed my entire outlook on how I will view the characters in reality TV from now on.

Lex has a son Corbin who, like my sons, has an Autistic disorder. To learn more about Autism you can click here. We will discuss, among other things, if having a son with autism affected his game play, if winning all those decent meals really helped him win more challenges, if he ever apologized to Kelly, and who he thought really deserved the million dollar prize.

RealityNewsOnline:I talked to Lindsey about the baggage she brought with her into the game – her insecurity and competitiveness. What baggage did you bring into Survivor?

Lex: Good question – I was not like some of the cast that tried to anticipate so many different situations that they were over-prepared for any situation. I did not prepare too much for the game, I surprised myself that I could get my act together at all.

I am very much a people person and initially relationships and being well-liked were important. I had a very easy time getting to know everyone. The producers probably put Tom and I on the same tribe thinking we would be at each other’s throats. It didn't happen. No matter what challenge they threw at me, I rose to the occasion.

I think I surprised the other players – they had their first impressions and saw me as a tattooed scrawny freak. They probably did not think I was an intellectual. Ethan was more surprised than anyone else, and Silas and Clarence – they were much more obviously athletic were probably surprised that I could do it. I surprised myself.

It was a shame to see Lindsey get so chewed up and spit out. I don't think she prepared herself for it being that gnarly and I have always had an easy time adapting and doing well, the ability to be flexible is an important aspect of the game. You have to be able to, at a moment’s notice, shift your strategy. A lot of people were like Lindsey and had a hard time readjusting their strategy and momentum.

RNO:You have children – do you think being a parent helps prepare you to shift gears easier than someone without kids?

Lex: If someone has more life experience, it really does help you in the game. Silas, Lindsey, Kim Powers, Kelly – the youngest ones out there – were not able to bring really a wealth of life's experience to Survivor. Being a parent and the parent of a child with a disability means having a lot of challenges thrown at you. You learn to be prepared for the unforeseeable. I was able to apply my life's experiences and it helped a lot.

RNO:It is rumored that one of your sons, River or Corbin, told everyone that his dad won Survivor.

Both of my kids probably walked around school telling people I won; they did not know I was in Africa when I was done. I am sure they thought I did win because I am their dad and of course they are going to think their dad won. I hope I am a superhero to my kids. I did not tell anyone, not even my wife, if I won.

RNO:Can you tell us about Corbin?

Lex: What do you want to know?

RNO:How did having a child with special needs affect your game playing?

Lex: It made it much harder for me to consider going out and dealing with all the challenges for two months knowing what they were going through at home. I knew it was going to be hard on my wife, but she really supported the idea. Having a kid with Autism, I worried more than another parent of a normal child might – he has seizures too, and I worried about that lot.

I worried about the effect it was going to have on him and, as it turned out, it was way too intense for Corbin. He did not like people talking about Survivor or having anything to do with it. He went into his room to avoid watching the show. I did not expect him to respond as negatively as he did. I know kids with Autism thrive on sameness, on routine, and going to Africa interrupted that routine. Coming back interrupted it again and our life since Survivor has been even less stable.

I did the harshest and worst thing I could have ever done for Corbin. I did not realize it when I went how it would change us. Everything is different now for all of us, and he has a hard time dealing with it. Little things that you might not expect set him off. When we watch the show and we all cheer at the same time – the abrupt change in noise is very disturbing to Corbin and hard for him to handle. I never meant for Corbin to be so upset by my decision to participate in Survivor, but I feel I made the decision for the right reasons and I think it will be good for all of us eventually. Hopefully I will have a change in career and be happy and make money and that will all trickle down to the people in my life. Maybe the experience itself and exposure will be good for Corbin eventually. This is the hardest thing I ever did. Infinitely harder than I ever thought it could be – I went into this thinking there is nothing I cannot do, and that has all been confirmed now. No matter what happens in my life I have no doubt I could get through it.

RNO:Some of the contestants have said the editing was not accurate, in that it took one bad moment and spread it out several times to make it look more extensive than it really was.

Lex: I hope that everyone who watches Survivor realizes it was a TV show; no one ever made a false promise that it was going to be a documentary. It was meant to provide riveting entertainment for 20 million people every week. The editors have days worth of footage and have to make the tapes look as compelling as they can. Everyone played the game differently. Some of us gave CBS a lot of material to work with and some did not. I made the commitment to be myself.

I don't believe in taking the safe road; if I come to a fork in the road and one side is smooth and safe but boring, and the other is filled with thorns, bumpy, inhospitable, and treacherous, but interesting, I take the more interesting one. Even if it is tougher.

I speak my mind, everyone knows where they stand as far as I am concerned. Anyone who knows me knows I am a colorful person and I think life is a great drama to be lived to the fullest. My agenda was to kick ass and win and be myself. They could have taken other aspects of my personality and focused on them. I gave them a lot of different things to use. I was a good Samaritan and a level headed leader. I also gave them emotional material – the guy who is losing his melon out there. The stuff they showed was accurate but it was not complete, human beings are not one-dimensional cardboard characters, but that is what they showed because that is what makes it interesting. Lindsey is not a super-oversensitive crybaby who cannot deal with life, they focused on the one most interesting dimension of her personality. I do not want to come across as a crybaby who says they were edited wrong. I would have been more upset if I did not have any air time. I was a formidable character and people will always remember me – good or bad, it does not matter. I don't seek the approval of others besides my family and friends.

RNO:You was generally well-liked. But you obviously said some really brutal things and took the game to a bloody level. How did you remain well-liked?

Lex: I was myself all the time. The only things I said off-camera that I did not say to people’s faces were when I discussed strategic moves I was planning on making. They probably showed the six times in 38 days that I said something violent.

I was well-liked by the people out there because I was a decent friendly person who takes an honest interest in other people. I had my moments, everyone did, but those bad moments were not my norm.

RNO:Who else picked up on Kelly being two-faced?

Lex: A lot of people felt that but were afraid to admit it; you don't know who else had a secret alliance and you risked alienating someone else.

Kim Johnson was the first to agree with me that there was a lot more to Kelly than meets the eye. We heard her talking to Clarence and saying she was on his side and then she would come back and tell us she wanted to be on our side; it was obvious she was waffling.

My gut is pretty much dead on. People mock my gut but I had a sense that there was something wrong and sour with her and that is why I voted her out. Even if she didn't vote for me, she was still there saying those terrible things about me to the producers, so my gut was right when it said she was not trustworthy.

RNO:When Kelly, you, and Tom went to the switch, why were you guys chosen to go?

Lex: When the switcheroo happened we never thought what was going to happen was going to happen – we thought we had a reward challenge; we all kind of thought that we needed to pick three people that as a team would be well-balanced. We thought it was going to be like an orienteering challenge using a map and compass. We picked three people we thought we would be skillful in a lot of ways; Tom has common sense and a good feel for the land, Kelly has a great memory, and I am a pretty well-rounded psychologically and physically. If Burnett was going to play a sadistic game like pick your three best people and send them out and take who was left we wanted to make sure we left behind a good balance of people no matter what would have happened. Had I known what was going to happen, Tom, Ethan, and I would have stuck together. We would have gone on the switch. Tom and Ethan talked about an alliance from day one and we shook hands on day two. Kim Johnson joined later. She was in our alliance, which is part of the reason why we carried her along in those first few challenges.

RNO:Kelly said she was mad at Kim because Kim betrayed the alliance that they made. Did you know they had an alliance too?

Lex: Kim says she never made an agreement with Kelly to go into an alliance and I don't believe for a second that Kim stabbed Kelly in the back. I don't think Kim was willing to make an alliance with Kelly when she already had one with us.

RNO:How many Survivors do you know of who required medical attention and what for? I know Ethan got a scorpion bite.

Ethan got a scorpion bite, Lindsey was dehydrated. I was pissing blood because my kidneys were shutting down and they told me I had to leave for a few hours to get rehydrated with an IV, but I refused to go. I was not going to leave the game, not even for a few hours, not until I collapsed. If the other players sensed I was weak, they would come after me. I kept that from them. All of that happened after the switch and when the water supplied dwindled to nothing. We rebuilt Samburu’s camp and my kidneys basically failed on me in the process. We went from having a lot of good water to having basically nothing.

RNO:Aside from yourself, who did you hope would win the million dollars and why?

Lex: I was happy with anyone in the final four getting the money. Looking back I would have also been happy with Frank or Teresa winning the game. Some people played a much smarter game. Those that played a more aggressive game, who made the tough decisions, those who played with integrity and honor were the ones I wanted to win. The ones who decided not to participate in the game as much and preferred to fly under the radar, I didn't want them to win as much.

RNO:Is it true that you hated reality shows before you went on Survivor?

Lex: It’s bullshit that I did not like reality shows – I don't know how that rumor got started. I have always been a fan of Survivor -- I do not like the low brow crap, I won't say which ones I don't like. Shows like Real World and Road Rules -- I am not a big fan of but I don't hate them. Amazing Race I thought was great and really followed that.

RNO:Who did you want to win Amazing Race?

Lex: Kevin and Drew all the way, but I also liked the mother-daughter team.

RNO:You apologized to Kelly when you voted her out yet people were still saying you should tell her you are sorry, again. Have you or will you ever do that?

Lex: I did apologize on camera when I voted her out and it is a game and it is a ruthless cutthroat game and like life is not fair, and Survivor is the same way. I felt comfortable that I did not say anything, or said very little that I regretted – things I said in the early episodes I may have regretted, things said before I got to know these people. When the game was over we all told each other what we said; it was all just part of the game. When I was reunited with the rest of the jury I did apologize to Kelly. I said, I know you didn't vote for me and I am sorry but that is the way the game is played. She has never apologized for the things she said about Frank and I – and I don't expect it even though she said some really horrible things about us. I take it as it is, as part of the game.

RNO:Have you been approached to do anything since the show ended?

Lex: Not as much as I was hoping for. I have been very busy doing benefits and charity events locally and the thing in Dallas – [last weekend] I [did] a benefit with Ashley Judd for the Elizabeth Glazer pediatric AIDS foundation. I really want to find some gainful employment on all this. I have an agent working with me but I have not signed on exclusively. It has been much more challenging for Survivor 3 cast to find work than it was for the previous two casts. Part of that is due to the 9/11 tragedy. We have to work ten times harder to make things happen and I willing to work my ass off to make things happen, I know I want to be in entertainment.

I feel like I have been giving an opportunity to make things happen and I plan to use it.

RNO:What would you like to say to those who believe you meant real violence, and did not seem to understand that when you talked about slitting someone's throat it was simply metaphorical and not in any way intended to be meant as a real physical threat.

Lex: I play a hard game and when I speak I use vivid terms, I obviously never intended to slit someone's throat. I was playing to win the whole damn thing.

RNO:What do your family and friends think of the way you were portrayed?

Lex: It was hard for my wife and my Mom; they know me and they know the kind of person I am and they know it was not an accurate picture of who I am. Kelly, my wife, was hoping CBS would show them that just because someone looks like me that people like us are not really freaks. My wife is on the PTA and she is a stay-at-home Mom. She feels that she has a great secret in who I really am and was hoping everyone else would see me the way she knows I really am. My family and friends are all cut from the same kind of cloth. We are all comfortable with who we are and don't really care how other people think.

RNO:Have the people you met since Survivor spoken to your face as badly as some of them do on the net?

Lex: The people that I have met in person have been extremely kind, really great people. If I met any of the ones online in person they have not reacted negatively to me. I think there is an issue with the Internet that allows everyone to speak their minds and say things they would not normally say. Message boards are filled with people just who are comfortable saying what they will about someone.

In the end I hope I taught them a lesson about judging someone who you don't really know. I was portrayed as a wild-eyed throat-slitting psycho, but I was also a team leader and I was genuinely thrilled when I got to go see the AIDS hospital and spend some time with kids who were on death’s door. That meant so much to me, I got so much out of that trip. Hopefully all these people who were quick to judge me saw me over 13 weeks and really got to see me as a balanced person. Maybe they wont be so quick to judge someone next time.

RNO:Do you read your own press? How does it make you feel?

Lex: I read it for a sick sense of amusement – I do not read it for confirmation on what kind of a person I am. None of those people know me and I could give a flying fuck about what anyone thinks about me if they don't know me. It is impossible for me to see things with an objective view so it was interesting to see things through that objective eye. For the first four weeks I was presented in a positive light and then all of a sudden, as soon as my character was portrayed as a bit off, everything changed. I wonder if it gave them the affirmation they were looking for, if they saw this freak with tattoos and they were just waiting to find something negative about me.

RNO:How much do you feel the reward meals helped you?

Lex: They helped to a certain extent but the bigger upside was the simple fact of having won, period. Food and nutrition feeds your body; the act of winning feeds your soul with confidence, and winning gave me more confidence to go in and win again. When people saw me win they started losing their confidence. I exploited the positive energy I was getting on my end and the negative energy on their end. There was not really that much extra food – only two meals more than everyone else had.

RNO:Did your experience as a marketing manager help you and how?

Lex: The school of hard knocks and life in general helped me. Having to be a freaky-looking guy that had to assimilate into the normal corporate atmosphere helped. With the tattoos and everything I found them to be a disadvantage. For six years had to hide the tats – I did not really like what I was doing but I live in the most expensive part of the country. I had to make enough money so that my wife could stay home because when you have a child with an autistic disorder, someone needs to stay home. I hope I don't have to go back to that. The job did not feed my soul. I have always had aspirations to do something more creative.

RNO:Did you keep your Avalanche?

Lex: I have yet to see to see my Avalanche. I have a 1970 Chevy right now. Old Gold – I will always have an old vintage automobile; I love them. But yes, I will keep the Avalanche because it is a kick-ass truck.

RNO:Have you heard anything about the rumored "Ultimate Survivor" with previous contestants?

Officially nothing has been announced – just a concept at the drawing board. If an invitation were presented I would jump at the chance. It will not be Survivor 5 since they are casting that now.

RNO:What part of the body hurts most when you get it tattooed?

Lex: Ribs hurt the most – lots of nerves; the torso – also very tender; and the elbow bone. Day before yesterday I had my right arm, the one that has the tiger was only half done so I am getting that finished up. It still hurts. The armpit, the spine – they are all very tender but the ribs are the worst.

RNO:It was reported on a message board that a fan saw that you had several packages that you sent off to CBS a few weeks before Christmas –someone saw you in the post office and many people speculated on what they were, I am still curious. Can you tell us what they were?

Lex: I saw that thread on that message board. I noticed that the guy who saw me at the post office got my return address from my mail was offering it to anyone who wanted it. That was crossing a line. I accept the kind of invasion of privacy that comes with the territory, but that just is not right. And to answer your questions, I was mailing Christmas presents to the 15 other survivors and to the producers, etc. I mailed off forty or fifty packages.

RNO:Have you seen the new cast members? Any thoughts?

Lex: I don't want to jump to conclusions, but Gina the nature guide from Gainesville, Florida, looks well rounded. So does Patricia the cosmetologist-truck assembler. My wife likes Gabriel Cade but my first impression, which may not be true, is that Gabe likes Gabe too.

It's hard to tell anything at this point because I have not seen anything but a still photo and read their bio.

RNO: Thanks, Lex!

Peggy Keller is Mother and Behavior Therapist to her two autistic sons and teenage daughter.

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