This year, Network Ten is shaking things up and serving us a whole slew of new shows, to varying degrees of success. We’ve had some smash hits, like Hunted Australia, and some not-so-smash hits, like The Real Love Boat. One of the shows we haven’t had a chance to check out yet, though, is The Traitors, a very Knives Out, Cluedo-style reality competition series hosted by Rodger Corser.
Prior to The Traitors, it’s more likely you’d recognise the Aussie actor from Doctor Doctor, Five Bedrooms or even way back in Underbelly. Chatting to POPSUGAR Australia, Corser spilled all the deets on his new hosting gig.
Noting that he’s “really excited” for everyone to finally get to see the show, Rodger said that while there’s “definitely elements you’ll recognise from other shows” — like the concept of voting people off — the pace of The Traitors sets it apart.
“It does go quite quickly, because within the one episode, two people will leave the game, and that’s not just occasionally,” he explained.
“There’s two ways for people to leave the game,” Rodger said, explaining that contestants are either “murdered by the Traitors” or “banished” by the Faithfuls. The catch? The Traitors are walking amongst the Faithfuls, trying their best to remain undetected.
“There are a number of Traitors, and then the rest are Faithfuls,” he said. “The Traitors don’t tell anyone except their fellow Traitors who they are, so everyone is claiming to be a Faithful. In our version there are four Traitors, but the Faithful don’t know how many there are.”
The aim of the game is to make it to the end of the competition, of course. If a Traitor gets to the end, they’ll automatically win the entire prize — a prize pool of silver bars worth up to $250,000. If a Faithful gets to the end, they’re presented with a choice: Either keep the lot for themselves, or split the winnings with the other remaining Faithful. Needless to say, it’s a set up that breeds a lot of tension and suspicion.
“Everyone has kind of got their eye on everyone else in the game and has got their suspicion, and can I say, it’s a lot harder to pick the people who are the Traitors or who are lying than it might seem,” Rodger said, “and the Faithful get it quite wrong, often, and start sending their own home, and that starts turning the heat up on everyone quite quickly, because they start to fail their job, and then people start to… perhaps lose their cool a little?”
He laughed.
“It’s interesting to watch, because people come in with a certain personality vibe, and then you really get to know who they are when you start to put a bit of pressure on them,” he said. “I mean, it’s not life or death, per se, but once they’re immersed in the game… it becomes very real to them, the stakes become very high.”
As for how he’d do if he were playing the game himself, Rodger said he’d much rather be a Faithful than a Traitor.
“I don’t know that I’d be a great Traitor!” he said. “I think it’s easier just telling the truth. I was never one of those guys who could date more than one person at once or anything like that, having different stories!”
He laughed. “The one truth is a lot easier. But even the people who are telling the truth, what’s difficult about the Faithful role is that you don’t trust anyone, because everyone is claiming to be Faithful, and of course, the majority are, but you just don’t know.
“People naturally gravitate toward alliances or become best friends on the show and what you’ll find is that some of those cliques had a Traitor in them,” he explained, adding that some of the Faithfuls were “just mortified” to realise that they’d been playing alongside a Traitor.
“Everyone knows it’s a game and that all bets are off while you’re inside it, but still, I think as humans we like to naturally trust people, it’s the default,” he said. “People do feel betrayed at the end when they realise someone’s been lying to the the whole time, especially deep into the game.
“Early on, it’s a bit different, they haven’t had much time to get to know one another, but when you’re entering the final half, people know each other, and it starts to get intense.”
The Traitors premieres at 7.30pm on Sunday, October 16, only on 10 and 10 Play on Demand.
