Joining the cast of Peacock’s upcoming competition and social game The Traitors seemed like the perfect fit for Kate Chastain, who most people know from her long-running stint as Chief Stew on Bravo’s Below Deck.
“My experience working with some of the Housewives really prepared me for people being fake and phony. So that was helpful,” Chastain tells PRIDE, adding that when she heard the description for the show it sounded like a great time. “I had never been to Scotland. I definitely like castle-type things. So that sounded like a fun experience to me.”
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For Reza Farahan, who weathered nine seasons of drama and backstabbing on his hit Bravo series The Shahs of Sunset, the invitation to join the cast couldn’t have come at a better time. “Shahs got canceled, and my producer called me and offered me this, and I was like in a fog. And I wanted to do a competition show. And it just seemed like it was just what the doctor ordered when I was reeling from Shahs being canceled,” he tells PRIDE.
He too felt like his reality TV series was great training for this new reality TV adventure. “I’m used to nine seasons of people coming for me. And when I read the description about the show, it sounded like Shahs of Sunset was going to prepare me for the traitors and the murderers,” he says with a laugh.
For those unfamiliar with the series, The Traitors is based on the hit Dutch show of the same name. It’s a social deduction game in which “the faithful’’ compete in a series of challenges to win a $250,000 prize. However, to win that sweet, sweet prize money, they first have to discover the identities of the “traitors” in their midst, a secret cabal who, every night, comes together to select one of “the faithful” to murder. They win if the game concludes and their secret identities are intact. The whole game is presided over by an arch and scenery-chewing Alan Cumming to add loads of gravitas (and even more camp) to the proceedings.
While paranoia runs high on the series, Farahan says his one hope going into the game was that he would end up one of the faithful. “I was praying to all of the people upstairs that I wasn’t going to be a traitor because I can lean dark, and Dark Reza is not cute. So I was strategizing like, oy vey, what am I going to do if I’m a traitor? People are going to be able to read me. I look menacing already, to begin with. I was having a dilemma.”
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Because of the show’s conceit, keeping the contestants locked down is a high priority. Farahan confesses that the isolation did get to him from time to time. “I didn’t realize the level of intensity that gets baked into a competition show, just from the surroundings you’re in, and the limitations of what you’re able to do on your own and the creature comforts that are taken away from you,” he recalls. “I wrote help on a piece of paper and the condensation I had. I went like this and I stuck it to my window. So if someone outside on the castle grounds could see they would come to my rescue.”
“And that was day one,” confirmed Chastain. “Listen, I went to Catholic school, and I was looking for ways to, you know, maybe break some rules. And I was impressed because they made it so hard to cheat. It’s impossible.”
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For Chastain, whose Below Deck stint somewhat prepared her for being cut off from the rest of the world, it was the physical challenges that presented the greatest difficulties for her. “I was most surprised by how physical the competitions were. Frankly, I’m not sure I would have gone out there if I had known that but I’m so glad they didn’t tell me,” she reveals with a laugh. “I thought it was all mental games hanging out in a castle, which sounded right up my alley: judging people in a castle wearing cute clothes. Yay! They conveniently left out the [inclusion of] physical competitions.”
“I was thinking, ’No wonder we’re in Scotland. This stuff might not be legal in America,’” Farahan jokes. “They couldn’t get away with having us do it in America. That’s how intense the competitions were.”
“And I have to say, I was surprised by the chef in the castle. I was thinking we’d be getting more Scottish delicacies. But we weren’t,” he adds.
“I think that at first, that chef was a little overwhelmed,” agrees Chastain. “But don’t you worry, being a chief stew I whipped him right into shape.”
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Now having played the game, both Farahan and Chastain have a better idea of what it takes to win. As for whom from their past would have made for great traitors, they definitely have ideas.
For Chastain, it would have to be one of her former Below Deck castmates. “Chef Ben would be such a good traitor. We’ve been friends for nine years. I even live upstairs from him. He’s watching my dog,” she shares. “But finally I figured out I can tell when he’s lying. But it took me nine years and he is very talented. His tell is if he whispers to me like listen, Kate. Like he’s doing me a favor. Okay, well, okay. You were trying to trick me.”
When asked, Farahan answered without a second’s hesitation: Mike Shouhed from Shahs of Sunset. “He’s good at lying, bro. He’s so good. Very good at lying,” he says, almost in reverence. “I think this game would be good for him. He could be a traitor and be very good and convincing that he’s not a traitor”
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As hard as the competition proved to be, on multiple levels, Chastain shares that she did learn something from the experience.
“Clichéd as it is: Don’t judge a book by its cover. So many times people thought I was the biggest threat, when really I was like I don’t know what the heck I’m doing,” she says. When you think you’ve got somebody nailed down? Oh, yeah, definitely the traitor, you never really know. The people that seem innocent are the liars. The people that seem like the liars are the innocent.”
