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Question: In selecting the people for this season, what was your role and who did you want that you couldn't get?

JP: We did something interesting with casting of the favorites. We refer to it as "the big con". We alluded to the fact that there would be 20 people on the season. So when we started talking to the favorites they figured there must be 20 favorites going, it's an All Stars season. So, we had 20 people on the hook thinking they were going. Knowing all along we were only taking 10 and that the other 10 were going to be fans. That for us was important because we knew all these guys were talking on the phone to each other and trying to build alliances before the show even started. So we wanted to complicate it a little bit. I think it worked. Some of the people that we wanted on the show and just didn't have a spot for...Shane from Exile Island. Yul, we wanted back. A couple of the people that we wanted that didn't want to do it were Tom Westman from Palau. I ran into Tom in New York. We were talking. I said, "If we ever did another All Star, would you do it?" He said, "There's no chance. Look at how it played for me. I came out as a hero. Everything went my way. I'm the fireman who was the nice guy and won. All I would do is tarnish that image. I'm not going through it again." The other person we really wanted back was Courtney from last season. She didn't want to do it either. So we had a couple people turn us down. But for the most part as you can imagine it was a feeding frenzy of favorites calling our casting director, pleading their case as to why they would make a good choice.

Question: I was wondering if you're aware that Yul is considering running for congress?

JP: We had Yul on our list to come back. We couldn't find a spot for him. As much as we liked Yul and Shane we just didn't know who we would take out to put them in. I had no idea he's running for congress. He's a sharp guy. He's so analytical and he's constantly looking at options. He was known for running scenarios.

Question: I talked to Coby from Palau. He said that he was on a list of potential candidates along with Janu and Terry. Is there any truth to that?

JP: Well, at a certain point, yes. He was being considered, at a certain point. I can't say how far into the mix he made it. We liked him on the show. He was great and so was Janu. The truth is, you have 10 spots. You have a couple of certains. You're gonna have Ozzy. You're gonna have Yau-Man. You're gonna have James. And you're gonna have Fairplay. Then you go to people like Cirie. Then you want somebody like Parvati. You want the quote, unquote, hot girl who's gonna flirt and maybe surprise everybody. Then you need the game changers in Eliza and Ami, people that will betray at the drop of a hat. If Ami can get her way she will get that girls alliance again that she had in Vanuatu and try to run the game. That's what I meant earlier about trying to handpick the right ten. It wasn't that these were the 10 most favorite, it was 10 favorites. I know there were some people that weren't selected and I know their feelings are hurt. It doesn't mean they weren't worthy of being on the season. It just means that we picked 10 people for reasons that have nothing to do about you.