Last week surfer, skateboarder and waiter Ozzy Lusth missed winning Survivor Cook Islands after he was beaten by Yul Kwon by one vote.
After I spoke to
Yul about his win I spoke to Ozzy about his loss - while thinking about him being in a porno TV show throughout natch. If you don't know about it - read on and find out. Here's what he had to outwit, outlast, outhippy:
Tashi: If you were watching Survivor as a viewer - so you weren’t you at all - who would you have wanted to win: Ozzy or Yul?
Ozzy: Frikkin’ Ozzy all the way. You know he’s a cool character, he’s mellow, probably anxious to change the world in some idealistic way but it would have been fun to watch.
Tashi: You played a completely solo game - was there anyone you truly trusted?
Ozzy: Since the show I’ve made friends with people and come to trust them but when the game was on - no I didn’t really have the opportunity. The people I was with at the very beginning - they ended up making stupid judgement calls, stupid decisions to vote people out that ended up getting themselves voted out - like Flica and Cao Boi and Cecilia, they were all really cool. They didn’t listen to me enough - in the beginning when we first merged, they shot themselves in the foot and let Yul and Becky and Sundra and Candice and Jonathan all continue on.
Tashi: Billy - I just remembered him and how adamant you were to get rid of him right at the beginning - was it the right thing to do?
Ozzy: Oh yeah - the thing is - just based on his personality - he was the ultimate Survivor fan. He knew everything about Survivor - he knew every challenge, everything you could imagine he knew about it. He was probably gonna be one of the hardest players out there if he’d gotten the chance to really get to his strategy - he would have been wheeling and dealing and backstabbing and doing anything possible to stay in the game - which could be a good thing or a very very dangerous thing. It was better to just cut and run we had the chance to get chance rid of him.
One thing the cameras didn’t show was - either he was playing it up or it was really was the case - but he wasn’t working at all and he was really sick and not keeping water down. There were a bunch of reasons we decided to let him go - what it comes down to was a trust, not feeling like he’d stick to our side.
Tashi: Do you think it’s possible to win Survivor without having a single alliance?
Ozzy: No. Let me rephrase that - yes, it’s possible but highly unlikely. The whole game of it now is really - if you want a good strategy you really have to have alliances - whether you’re on the inside or outside of an alliance. How that’s affected by the twist is how the game unfolds. I think that sometimes if you make the wrong alliance too early it can really hurt your chances of getting anywhere. If you have an alliance with someone who’s sort of an idiot or loudmouth you’re gonna take that reputation onto yourself.
I think what Survivor’s about is having an alliance that’s like an onion - where you’ve got people on the inside, people in the middle and people on the outside - having one or two people who you really can trust to go all the way with proves to be the most effective strategy I think - like Yul and Becky and Rob and Amber in All Stars.
Tashi: Yes they had an implicit trust.
Ozzy: They did and for some reason - I don’t know what was going through people’s heads in All Stars - but everyone knew they were together a short while into things and there were opportunities where they could have voted them out but they didn’t - they let them hang around and that’s what let them win.
Tashi: Maybe they were entertained having them around or something.
Ozzy: I think so, I think what it also is is that some people are just too hard to get along with. Like Billy and Christina on my team - I just, I couldn’t get along with these people - spending 39 days with them would have been impossible and I knew that. I knew I couldn’t make an alliance with them and I knew I had to do it another way.
Tashi: Why did you enter the show?
Ozzy: To win a million dollars. *laughs* That’s not really
why - the real main reason was to sort of prove to myself I have what it takes. To get back to ancestral roots - being a hunter/gatherer – I’ve always been fascinated with surviving, since I was a kid - books like Robinson Crusoe and other teen adventure novels.
Whenever I’d fly somewhere I’d kinda hope in the back of my mind that the plane would go down and I’d be the only Survivor on a deserted island. That opportunity arose in the ideal setting with a medical staff waiting just in case you happen to chop off your leg or get eaten by some crazy animal.
Tashi: On first impressions it didn’t look like that’s how you’d be - everyone else who’s been a provider has always been this big - you know - type.
Ozzy: I wanted to show people that when you see what people look like - if you judge them by what they look like you’re going to be in for a surprise. I wanted to show that it’s not about how big your muscles are but about how you use them and your brain. You can be the strongest man in the world without accomplishing anything.
Tashi: What was your most difficult jury question?
Ozzy: I think the one that made me look like the biggest idiot was: “What are you going to do with the money,” I wish that I hadn’t … I strayed from myself at that point and I didn’t speak truthfully to my heart to what I would do with it. Maybe it was obvious to the jury members, maybe I was … I don’t know, not being totally honest with them. In hindsight I should have been.
Tashi: What would you have said if you could answer it again?
Ozzy: That I wanted to build a surfing/skateboarding resort in Mexico - a place where skateboarders and surfers could go to relax and have a vacation with their family’s or whoever. An epic surf location with epic skateboarding obstacles and coarses right next to it.
Tashi: Your
porno stint (Warning: NSFW) on the reality show Foursome - talk about that for a bit.
Ozzy: Well you know, it was basically my - I don’t know, I guess it was my quintessential experience of coming to LA and getting myself into trouble. I didn’t really realize the extent of my actions and how they would *laughs* be documented. You know I had no intention of ever becoming a public figure so I went into it with the idea that I wanted to have fun and be wild and crazy. In hindsight of course I think it was a mistake and I wish I hadn’t gone so crazy. At the same time I can check it off my list of things you do in your life.
Tashi: How long before Survivor did you do it?
Ozzy: I think it was about a year.
Tashi: So then when you got on Survivor and it was on TV in the US - did it just explode everywhere?
Ozzy: Yeah pretty much - the people at CBS were pretty ticked off with me. I couldn’t really tell them ‘cos I thought they wouldn’t let me do Survivor if I told them about it.
Tashi: Did you have to audition for it? (not Survivor obviously)
Ozzy: No it wasn’t really audition it was just kinda like … I guess it was - it was just standing in front of someone with a video camera and them asking you different questions like: “What’s your idea of a perfect woman?” and “What would be your perfect date?” and that kinda stuff. It turned out more wild than I thought it was gonna be - I could have said, “No I’m not into it,” but I just decided to take the bull by its horns - as it were - and go with the whole experience and not hold back.
Tashi: Did you do it to be on TV? Why did you do it?
Ozzy: No I didn’t do it to be on TV - it was going to be on a channel that I was hoping no-one really watched. It was more the chance to have fun with a couple of girls and get paid a little bit of money and that was it.
Tashi: What are you up to now?
Ozzy: I did a kind of a B-grade horror movie - you know Martin Sheen? Well his brother’s an actor also, Joe Estevez - I did a horror with him about a year ago and it should be out by Fall. It’s called
The Lights.
Tashi: Who do you play in it?
Ozzy: I play this nerdy kid who brings his friends out into the country to watch a meteor shower and then we get killed by a homicidal maniac.
Tashi: *laughs* Well at least it sounds a bit better than Rob Cesternino’s horror film he did for E! with all the reality stars in it - Kill Reality. So you’ve done that and what else?
Ozzy: I’ve been writing, gotten published in a couple of online publications - I’m doing photography as well - I just shot the stills for a music video. I’m loving it, there are so many opportunities that have opened up for me.
Tashi: What sort of thing do you write?
Ozzy: I’m actually writing a book about coconuts. It’s sort of a homage to the tree of life - the coconut. It’s not gonna be a novel per se, it’s gonna be more of a coffee table, kind of a fun, poetic experience.
Tashi: *laughs* Ookay.
Ozzy: The life story of Ozzy is yet to be completed. I probably need a few more years of life experience before it’ll make it interesting. Since Cook Islands has been on in South Africa I’d like to put together a trip to cruise out there to do some surfing and maybe a Safari and see what South Africa’s all about - I’m sure it’s just amazing. There are a couple of friends I’ve met in my travelling who are from South Africa and they all seem like really, really cool people.
Ends