In a scene from Season 3 of “Alone Australia,” Ceilidh, a young deaf woman, looks up at a bird on a tree limb far above and remarks that it is a white-bellied sea eagle. She adds that her father had a tattoo of the bird on his arm, and goes on to explain that he was her greatest champion, but died of leukemia when she was a teenager.
After a pause, she says, “It’s like my dad is watching over me.” It’s a scene that encapsulates the emotional appeal of the show, in which 10 survivalists compete for a large cash prize by attempting to be the last person standing in a wild, inhospitable location.
As Tom, another of the contestants, says on his arrival in Western Tasmania, “It’s cold, it’s rugged, it’s unforgiving. All 10 of us are batshit crazy.”
Ceilidh in Season 3 of “Alone Australia”
Courtesy of SBS
The show launched in the U.S. 10 years ago on the cable channel that is now called History and is currently airing its 12th season. The A+E Media Group format has been replicated in 10 countries, and in Australia, it is broadcast by SBS, with Season 4 in production in the Arctic. The show is the most watched SBS-commissioned series in the network’s history.
Joseph Maxwell, SBS head of unscripted, sees the show as a documentary featuring 10 interwoven stories, but the fact that the contestants shoot their own footage and record the sound themselves gives it a “raw, unfiltered feel,” he says. “They’re telling it, they’re choosing what to say, when to say it, they’re filming it. It’s totally unproduced, undirected.”
The show features some “yuck” moments, like when Shay, a professional trapper, fills his mouth with worms, but for Maxwell, that’s fine. “If someone’s eating something disgusting, it’s not gratuitous. That’s what they’re facing at the moment. Sometimes you hear the sounds of someone vomiting. We may not choose to show certain graphic shots, but, again, it’s just sticking really close to that experience of what it is.”
Corinne in Season 3 of “Alone Australia”
Courtesy of SBS
The show also features a choice selection of curse words. “We’re letting them speak as they naturally speak, because the camera almost becomes like their Wilson, their friend, who they talk to, who they confess to,” Maxwell says, referring to the Tom Hanks film “Cast Away” in which Hanks’ stranded character befriended a volleyball.
The participants’ control of the cameras and audio adds to the sense of intimacy, fostering a bond with the viewer, and this influences the casting. “We really want people who will tell us something about themselves, and we encourage that, that they’re going to tell their story in their way, when they want,” Maxwell says.
However, for the broadcaster and the show’s production company, ITV Studios Australia, this also equates to a lack of control. “Every other reality show, you’ve got a bunch of levers that you can pull: You send in the producer, you send in the director, you ask this question, you do a retake. We have no control of this show. It’s totally unfiltered and raw, and that makes it a terrifying show for the production company and for the broadcaster. It’s unlike any other thing,” he says.
ITV Studios Australia’s chief content officer, Beth Hart, concurs. “What is strange as a producer, and I’ve produced thousands of hours of TV, is that usually what you do is you cast your cast, and then you put them on camera and you watch every single thing they do. Here, you cast your cast, you prepare them, and then you send them off and you don’t see them. So, it’s a real exercise in trust, and it’s also an exercise in relinquishing control,” she says. “As a producer, it is probably one of the most nerve-wracking experiences that I’ve ever had.”
The dangers posed by the environment are real and not contrived or exaggerated by the producers to ramp up the tension, Hart says, but the sense of jeopardy can be heightened during the edit, although until the production team receives the footage, they have no idea what to expect.
“We never know where our jeopardy is going to come from. We don’t know when the weather is going to change. We don’t know when someone is going to injure themselves. And so often, it’s not until we get it back into post-production, and we’re like, ‘Oh, this would be a great end of episode.’ ‘How bad is the storm?’ ‘Will the shelter survive?’”
Hart acknowledges that the show is a contest — with a “life-changing” prize on offer, A$250,000 ($164,000) — but it becomes much more than that, she says. “Winning this really is a personal journey for most people. Money is more important to some than others, but mostly they’re doing it to see if they can. And that authentic purpose is baked through the whole program. The fact that they don’t know how many other competitors are left in the game is a kind of psychological torment for them, and that is why in this show you compete against yourself, not others.”
The non-human residents of the Tasmanian wilderness play an important role in the show too, and not just as a reluctant meal. As well as the famous Tasmanian devil, there is a lesser known but equally cute carnivorous marsupial, the quoll. “This curious quoll kept visiting one of our participants, and in the end, she named it, and it was sleeping on her bed with her and stealing her bits of dried jerky. It had a real personality and became a massive part of the program,” Hart says. “We have birds that visit repeatedly, and, of course, sometimes we’re hunting for animals. And then it’s a completely different type of storyline.”
Ten years after its launch, the show continues to stand apart from other reality formats, says Patrick Vien, A+E Global Media’s group managing director, international. “There’s really nothing like it. Sure, there are other adventure competition programs out there, but this is unique because it really blends the authenticity of a documentary lens inside what is a competition program, and that gives it an element of palpable reality.
“When you’re watching ‘Alone,’ you feel like you’re there. And there’s an emotional reaction to it, to that isolationism. They are shooting the show themselves. There’s no crew behind them or nearby. And from that standpoint, I think it delivers. It delivers on this vicarious experience.”
