Found this on IMDB
Phil Keoghan is heading into his 11th season as host of “The Amazing Race,” and this time it’s “All-Stars.” Phil took a minute while sitting in L.A. traffic last week to talk about the show, how the all-star teams were picked, what he thinks of Jeff Probst and Ryan Seacrest, and how he stays ahead of the pack.
Q: How did you go about picking teams for “The Amazing Race: All-Star Edition?”
A: After 10 seasons and more than 100 teams, we really had some great teams to pick from, and I think it’s good that we waited for at least 10 seasons before we did it. There were just certain teams that were must-picks.
Q: Who stands out the most?
A: The one team I’ve been asked more questions about in all the press I’ve done around the world for the show is Charla and Mirna. They just really captured people’s imagination and they’ve been the most talked about, most celebrated team in the press.
Q: So they were in. Where do you go from there?
A: Then you build on that and get a sense of who everyone’s talking about. I had 15 teams on my wish list that CBS asked me to do, and 10 of those teams [on my list] correlated with the casting people’s choice. The Eric and Danielle combination was the only one that didn’t, and they had been on two different teams originally. And that was a great idea of casting to throw a little something different in the mix.
Q: But you couldn’t get everybody?
A: Certainly there are teams you would love to see come back -- the bowling moms, Karen and Will, Colin and Christie [and many more]. That’s what the casting people were grappling with, of course. You’ve also got to create the right mix of those teams. You’re got to have the antagonists, the heroes, the cruisers, gay, straight, white, black, short, tall, Democrat, Republican. It’s a clever thing that the casting people do, and at the end of the day you’ve got to trust the casting people. They’ve got it right 10 times, why not now?
Q: One team that’s been vocal about being left out was B.J. and Tyler [the hippies]. What did you think about that?
A: Well, the casting people had to make some difficult choices. On their own, absolutely I would think of them as an all-star team, but some teams are just not going to make the cut. It’s tough to know that we couldn’t put all the great teams in. Obviously, in terms of buddies, two guys, the casting people chose to keep The Guidos [Joe and Bill], Kevin and Drew, and Oswald and Danny.
Q: And, of course, Rob and Amber are back.
A: There’s no way you could leave them out. If they weren’t in the lineup, you’d be asking the question, “How could you leave them out?” But if you’re saying to me that we’re looking for the most talked about, sometimes controversial, engaging team, then they have to be in there. They’re a team that really polarizes fans. Some people don’t have a lot time for them, and there are people that really love them.
Q: What is it about Rob that makes him so engaging to watch?
A: The intensity that he has for competing. He has an attitude that some people might read as arrogant, other people might read as really energizing. It’s so subjective, isn’t it, what you think of people? Why is it that we have a president that polarizes people’s feelings so much? It comes down to a personality thing. It’s all in how you perceive people. I think [Rob’s] interesting to watch on television and we would be remiss in leaving them out because even people who don’t like them are interested to see what’s going to happen to them.
Q: How did you feel about the idea for “The Amazing Race” when it first came up?
A: To be honest, I felt then that if you get to host a show like this, just get to do it once, and go around the world, it would be an amazing experience. And it was perfectly in line with the sort of stuff that I love. Up until that point, I’d spent 16 years on the road, so the idea of shooting around the world wasn’t new to me. But doing something of this scale was certainly very exciting and, to me, very original. I’d never been a part of something of this scale. There was a lot of risk involved, in terms of none of us knowing how it was going to work out, and is it realistic for us to be able to finish a show in this amount of time?
Q: How has it turned out?
A: I never thought I would be having this conversation with you now, 11 seasons later. It’s not that I wasn’t positive about the possibilities, but if you’d said to me then, before we even did Season 1, that we’d be doing an All-Star version of “The Amazing Race” in 11 seasons, I would have said, “Hold on a minute. You don’t understand what we’re talking about here. This is a lot of people going around the world.” I feel lucky to be part of it. I missed out on “Survivor” to get this, and I remember thinking after that, what else could come up that I’d really want to work on? And this was very in synch with my interests and pushing people out of their comfort zones. In this book I wrote, the first big chapter is about facing your fear, and there are others about taking a leap of faith and testing your limits. All of those themes are part of what “Race” is about. It’s not like I’m hosting a home makeover show, say. That’s a great show, but it’s not where my area of expertise is.
Q: I didn’t know you were in the running for hosting “Survivor.” Can you explain that one?
A: My understanding is that it was between Jeff [Probst] and I for the “Survivor” job. I’d known Jeff for a long time, we’d worked at Fox together. And Jeff and I ended up sitting outside [then-CBS President] Les Moonves’ office at one point, joking about how crazy it was that we were both going in to meet Les. Obviously, I didn’t get that job, he got the job. There was no doubt I was disappointed. I knew it would be a fun show to do. It was an amazing format and I knew it could be a great franchise. But “Race” came up not too long after that, and with the same network, and it’s great. “Race” is more in synch with my area of expertise. I’ve been traveling since I was 2. My dad was scientist and he traveled around a lot.
Q: So you’re okay with how things turned out?
A: I can’t imagine the show without him now. He’s just become such a part of the fabric of the show, I can’t imagine the show without him. Everybody’s trying to, like, create a little rivalry between us, and work out who’s gonna kick whose **bleep**, and who can outwit and outlast the other. And I tell people we actually like each other, respect each other. It’s true. We’ve known each other for long time and we try to support each other in the different things that we do.
Q: Which show do you think is more difficult [to host]?
A: One of the things I’ve been trying to do is get together with him to talk about our experiences. I don’t know a lot about what his life is like on “Survivor” out there, wherever he is. I’ve always wanted to know what it’s like, so I can’t really make an accurate assessment of that. I think they’re both quite different in the sense that we’re constantly moving and his job is about being in one place. I have a lot of respect for him. There are a lot of hosts, but not a lot of very good hosts, and I think Jeff is good, and Ryan Seacrest [on “American Idol”] is, in a different way, because he has a different kind of host approach. I don’t know what it is that separates good from very good, but Jeff and Ryan are very good hosts.
Q: So you watch “American Idol?”
A: I don’t really watch any TV, but it’s probably the only show I end up watching because I want to hang with my daughter [who is 11], so I watch that show.
Q: People think you’re showing your personality more in recent seasons. Why is that?
A: I don’t think it’s a matter of me choosing to show my personality, but the show choosing not to cut more of my personality out. I don’t feel like I’ve really changed. When the teams get to the mat, I mess with them big time. We talk about stuff that wouldn’t even make it to the air because it’s so risqué. I’ve never worked so hard on a show where I do so much stuff, but it’s not like there’s a huge amount of that put on camera. The show is tight, so there’s not a lot of room for that.
Q: So some people have the wrong impression of you?
A: Some people haven’t seen any of my other shows and it’s like they’re surprised by the idea that I mess with the racers or even have a sense of humor. But if you ask any team about the mat chat … we talk about all kinds of things. I love working with people in front of a camera, working off the cuff and just going with it. My favorite part of “Amazing Race” is meeting teams at the mat, talking to them, feeding off their enthusiasm. I’m excited for them to be on the show.
Q: What’s it like for you to shoot the show and stay ahead of all the teams?
A: People always say to me, ‘You must go shopping or go hang in your hotel or just chill when teams going to their challenges.’ I think it’s because the show comes on once a week, and people think there’s all this time in between. But do you realize this show is shot in 28 days? The whole season, 13 shows, 50,000 miles plus -- that’s an average of [just over] two days per show, and I’m going where they’re going, so do the math.
Q: Which was the toughest?
A: This season was the most grueling on me, physically. Just the scheduling and the hours, the loss of sleep, my bag got lost for five days. I lost a lot of weight. I always lose weight [during the race], but this one really knocked me and a lot of people around.
Q: You have to wait for all the teams to leave on a leg before you can head out. How do you catch up?
A: Obviously, we know where we’re going, but [sometimes] I’ve got to go straight to the pit stop, meet the first team and try to work out where there’s a gap [between incoming teams] to go shoot a detour or a roadblock.
Q: When is it most difficult?
A: In the pit stops when you’re just hanging, waiting for a team. That’s the only time that we stop, and sometimes you’re in a desert at the end of a road and the only place to sit down is a cooler or a production box, and you’re using an umbrella to shield you from the sun and getting absolutely roasted waiting for these teams. But it seems like every time we’re in pit stop that’s glorious with a beautiful house, all the teams check in within a half an hour.
Q: And you’ve had some close calls, where you barely made it to the mat before the first team did, right?
A: It happens a lot, actually. More than people would realize. I got detained in a Ukraine immigration office once from 2am to 10am. And I made it to the pit stop, just barely. But there was a point where they didn’t know what they were going to do [if I didn’t make it]. Fortunately, one of the women from the embassy was a huge fan of “Amazing Race” and managed to get me a visa in record time.
