Tony-winning stage actor and Emmy-nominated TV star Alan Cumming takes on a very different role as the host and games master of new Peacock reality show The Traitors.
This unscripted competition series, which dropped its full season on the streaming service, is “a nail-biting psychological adventure in which treachery and deceit are the name of the game.”
Twenty contestants, including reality stars like Brandi Glanville and former Bachelor Arie Luyendyk Jr., compete in a series of challenges, with a quarter of a million bucks at stake. But the twist is, three of their kind are secretly traitors trying to undermine them — and even conspiring to “murder” them.
For Cumming, it was a chance to let his hair down, he told ABC Audio in December. “I did have an absolute blast. I mean, I really think it’s my favorite thing I’ve done all year. I’ve done some really exciting projects and played some great parts. But actually, if I had to choose one thing to do again, it would be this.”
He adds, “It was so hilarious and playing the character, a sort of heightened character, and it was so campy and Bond villain-y. And then I became really, you know, invested in the game myself.”
The traitors are chosen in dramatic fashion, with all contestants blindfolded and Cumming secretly tapping the undercover baddies on the shoulder. The actor ate it up. “I would make the producers text me who … the traitors were going to murder every night in their ‘turret.’ It’s the campest thing, and there’s cloaks and everything. So I just I had such a hoot.”
He explained, “I love a game … I love all kind of sort of confusing people. And that was really up my street.”
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