CBS Keeping An Eye Out On "Survivor"
Credit: New York Daily News Online
Monday, July 09, 2001
When "Survivor" executive producer Mark Burnett arrives at the Shaba National Reserve in Kenya this week to start taping "Survivor: Africa," he'll be joined by a CBS programming practices executive.
It will mark the first time that a watchdog has been deployed on location to oversee "Survivor" in progress. 'Survivor' executive producer Mark Burnett But, says Burnett, he won't change his shooting style in Africa or look over his shoulder.
"I'm not going to fix what isn't broken," Burnett told The News. "We have a good show and basically we'll use exactly the same formula as we have in the previous year."
There will be at least one change, however. Burnett has replaced contestants' rice tins with containers of maize, ground-up corn.
There is evidence that "Survivor: Africa" is likely to be a bigger undertaking than its predecessors, with a greater concern about security. Anti-government activists in Kenya have objected to the crew's presence in the game reserve, according to local newspaper reports.
Burnett told The News that he has quadrupled the size of the security staff and secured a deal with government officials to enforce a no-fly zone over the compound to discourage unwanted observers.
CBS did assign a program practices executive to its first two installments of "Survivor" — shot in Borneo and Australia — but that person remained at CBS headquarters while the show was filmed on location.
The network is aware that this third edition of "Survivor" is likely to come under more intense scrutiny and wants someone on site during the $1 million contest.
Like other networks, CBS employs monitors to preview episodes of shows, or pre-read scripts of series, movies and specials before they are shot, to cut sexual references or language that violate its broadcast standards.
Executives already have looked in on CBS' "Big Brother 2," a reality show being filmed on the network lot this summer.
CBS' careful look at "Survivor" comes after a lawsuit filed against the network and Burnett's Survivor Entertainment Group by Stacey Stillman, who charged the producer with influencing contestants in last summer's original "Survivor" to vote her off the show.
It also comes after critics blasted Burnett in May when he acknowledged reshooting a scene for "Survivor: The Australian Outback" using contestant stand-ins.
CBS spokesman Chris Ender denied that the network's on-site presence is the result of Stillman's suit. Since the first "Survivor," CBS has invested more in developing reality shows, Ender said, and network officials decided to expand the role of its program practices division.
"The program practices department has always been involved with 'Survivor,'" said Ender. "It just makes sense that as this programming genre has grown and continues to evolve at CBS, the role of a programming practices person should evolve with it.
"Mark Burnett wants to do everything in his power to prove that he has nothing to hide and to demonstrate that the show is produced in a fair and responsible manner."
