“That Afternoon, Everything Changed for Me” – RealityNewsOnline’s Exclusive Interview with Survivor: Tocantins’ Spencer

RealityNewsOnline: Hello, Spencer, and thanks for taking the time to talk to RealityNewsOnline!

Spencer: Thanks. I read RNO! I’m a Survivor dork, so of course I read it.

RNO: That’s great! Then you probably know my usual first question, which is, starting at the beginning, what was your strategy coming into the game?

Spencer: My strategy was to find a couple people that I could somewhat trust and at least hope that I could go to one of them at different times to discuss strategy. I know you can’t trust anybody, but hopefully I could rely on them a good bit to see stuff that I didn’t see. I wanted to create somewhat of a secret alliance and get numbers with other people and work from there.

RNO: We didn’t get to see a whole lot of you – what did you do in terms of strategy that we didn’t get to see?

Spencer: On Day 2, I went to Joe and Sydney, who I bonded with on the trek to camp. I went to them and created an alliance. Joe wanted to pull J.T. in but we didn’t really trust J.T. at that point. Also at that point, all the guys built the shelter and bonded really well and built an unspoken alliance. We confirmed it the next day.

Last episode, when Sandy was in the water with Taj, J.T., and Stephen, saying if they vote out Sydney then Stephen will be upset, they found out our alliance – they saw we hung around together a lot. They were trying to bring up our alliance while they had four people in the tribe.

RNO: From the TV viewer’s viewpoint, it looked like the tribe just turned against you because of that one challenge. Did you have any indication that you might be on the outs before that happened?

Spencer: No, I was not on the outs before that happened. That afternoon, everything changed for me. We only had maybe four hours back at camp before Tribal Council and emotions were still high. It was frustrating that I didn’t have more time.

I didn’t go home because of the challenge. When we were in the water, J.T. was upset with me and I explained where I was coming from and that I was really bothered [by my performance too]. We agreed to re-up the guys’ alliance and agreed to vote Sydney out. But Joe liked her and was not ready to vote her out. He told her it was her or me and she said okay.

I was not aware of the switch, I thought it was me or Taj. When I left camp, I had a feeling it was me but I thought it was Taj. It was at Tribal Council when I found out I was going home – they were taking way too long to write T A J. I was like, okay, it’s not Taj. That’s when it hit me.

RNO: You mentioned several factors that played into the vote – what else do you think was involved?

Spencer: Joe, I know, was irritated with me from the challenge. Even though I was able to smooth things over with J.T., Joe was still irritated. But Stephen was in Syndey’s ear for a week, telling her I was untrustworthy because I was a superfan and I’d been making side deals – he was just trying to convince Sydney I wasn’t trustworthy so she would turn on me, and he was able to do that. With Joe and Sydney, those two factors made it really easy to turn on me and vote me out.

RNO: So you let everybody know you were a superfan?

Spencer: That kind of accidentally came out. It was really hard to keep it in. we would talk about what’s our strategy for Exile Island and I would think of these ideas. Stephen kind of thought I was [a superfan] anyway because on the trek in, they asked how old I was and I said 19 – he said I was the youngest Survivor ever, so they assumed I must be a huge fan. And I couldn’t contain my excitement when we got treemail or figuring out what the rewards were.

RNO: On your CBS bio, it says you’re a Cubs fan. So, like me, you know what it’s like to suffer. How did Survivor compare?

Spencer: (laughs) The only thing suffering-wise in Survivor is the hunger, and that comes and goes. The adrenaline [keeps you going], so I was fine. It was incredible, an amazing experience. I would totally do it again – I did the thing I wanted to do my entire life. It’s sick, but I kind of enjoyed starving because it was part of the show. It was like, “Yes I am on Survivor!”

RNO: You waited half of your life to play this game. How did it feel to get voted out when you did?

Spencer: So depressing. I was so upset. I didn’t even have a switch or a merge. That’s pathetic. That’s me being hard on myself – it happens. It wasn’t like they said, “You’re the least deserving,” they had a strategic move and that’s fine. When I was voted out, I was thinking, “I’m so bummed that I’m leaving so early,” I could easily have lasted 39 days.

RNO: Did you think your Survivor fanaticism would help you out?

Spencer: Oh I definitely thought it would help me out – I thought I could predict twists and rewards and Exile. When Brendan picked somebody to go to Exile Island in Episode 2, he took a long time. I raised my hand because I wanted to find the idol because it’s easy to find in past seasons. But it hurt me because they found out I was a big fan and really devious, which I really wasn’t.

RNO: Speaking of devious, according to an article on the AfterElton website, you and Survivor: China winner Todd are dating. I’m presuming it’s true since they quoted quite a bit from Todd, so how is that going?

Spencer: I’m not allowed to talk about that. Sorry.

RNO: Well, if it’s true, I wish you the best. Getting back to the show, we’ve seen some signs of J.T. being a nice, fun guy, and other signs of him being something of a jerk. Which is he?

Spencer: He’s a great guy. He’s very helpful – he helped build the shelter and showed us how to fish. He’s a great guy, he’s just very competitive. It can come across that way. I loved the other five people who were left. I had a great tribe, I had no complaints about my tribe.

RNO: What was the most eye-opening thing you saw on TV that you didn’t know about while you were there?

Spencer: There was nothing that shocked me because I didn’t really get talked about that much because I was a minor character. This week, it kind of sucked to hear them say I should go home, but it was not a big shocker.

The whole Exile Alliance, I was unaware of it. And nobody else on my tribe was [aware of it], to my knowledge. It’s really really annoying that they get so much freaking air time – challenges and that get half the episode. Get over it already!

RNO: Do you have anything else you’d like to tell us about your time on Survivor?

Spencer: It was amazing! It was a dream come true. I was so fortunate and I got to live out a dream. I loved all 15 days.

RNO: Thanks again, Spencer!

If you haven’t already, be sure to check out these other recent Survivor: Tocantins articles here on RealityNewsOnline:

David Bloomberg is the Editor of RealityNewsOnline and can be reached at RNO@pobox.com.

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