Kevin & Drew Unleashed: A Preview

When the first season of The Amazing Race began, it didn’t catch on immediately with many fans. However, the message boards, began to buzz about the show, with heroes and villains as grand as the first season of Survivor. Chief among them were Kevin O'Connor and Drew Feinberg: ex-fraternity brothers who spent eleven episodes seeing the world, arguing with each other, and making audiences laugh.

This week, the duo that was called "the best reality contestants EVER" by Entertainment Weekly will star in Kevin and Drew Unleashed, a three episode series from Discovery Channel. Compared by the network to The Simple Life, this show sends Kevin and Drew around the country as they try out new things and make new friends along the way.

The first episode, premiering this Thursday, sends the fellas to Florida to work on an alligator farm, where they have to harvest eggs and deal with a full-grown gator. From there, they go to New England, as work in a cranberry bog.

In episode two, airing on July 15, Kevin and Drew go to a new-age health spa in upstate New York. What seems to be a relaxing environment turns competitive. The next stop of their tour dumps them at a brewery, where they learn to make beer. But can they keep from drinking their creations?

The final episode, scheduled for July 22, sends the boys to Oklahoma, where they work as cowboys, doing such things as branding colts and riding mechanical bulls. Next stop: South Carolina, where the Frats take part in some deep-water shrimping. Finally, they head to Drew's home borough of Staten Island, where they work the field for the Staten Island Yankees.

Kevin and Drew first met in 1984, as Kevin was pledging Delta Psi Upsilon at St. John's University in New York. Seventeen years later, they starred on The Amazing Race, running in eleven legs before bowing out in an intense climax in Beijing to Bill Bartek and Joe Baldassare, the infamous Team Guido. But the Frats proved to be the most popular team, garnering a 94% popularity rating on the show's home page. While the intrepid duo still have day jobs (Kevin as a senior manager at a consulting firm, Drew as a senior court officer in Brooklyn Supreme Court), they have popped up on television, most notably on The People's Choice Awards, Street Smarts, and on The Rosie O'Donnell Show.

Even with Race duos such as Oswald and Danny, Ken and Gerard, and Jon and Al, you'd be hard-pressed to find a pair as fun as Kevin and Drew. Besides Entertainment Weekly’s hurrah, Variety called them “the most entertaining of the bunch” and TV Guide said “they emerged as [The Amazing Race’s] undisputed stars.”

The first episode of Kevin and Drew Unleashed will air on July 8 at 10/9 Central. If the Frats are anywhere near as funny as they were three years ago, we'll be in for a treat.

Jason Borelli is a writer based in Staten Island, NY. If you want to compliment him or complain, e-mail him at lantern75@earthlink.net.

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