'Survivors' take an all-star turn

HOLLYWOOD — For every previous edition of "Survivor," the casting process has been long and laborious. Not so with "Survivor: All-Stars."

"In the past, it has been seven months searching the country, thousands and thousands and thousands of videotapes to be looked at, a casting team of 40 people working 15-hours a day looking at every single tape received," said creator/executive producer Mark Burnett.

He made it clear, "It's not that scientific this time" — that he went with his "gut feeling" to choose which 18 contestants would return for "All-Stars," which debuts Sunday after the Super Bowl on CBS (KUTV/Ch. 2).

"I got a yellow legal pad, wrote down 24 names and cut it to 18. It was that quick," Burnett said.

Well, that and a bit of consultation with host Jeff Probst, CBS president Leslie Moonves and some other network executives, which is standard practice. "We sometimes take three, four days to debate back and forward from these unknowns," Burnett said. "And this time it was all over and done with in one morning."

"It was who were the most memorable people," Probst said.

"Most memorable" doesn't necessarily mean most successful. Four of the seven previous winners — Richard Hatch (Borneo, the first "Survivor"), Tina Wesson (Australia), Ethan Zohn (Africa) and Jenna Morasca (Amazon) — are back, as are one survivor who finished second, four who finished third and two who finished fourth. But so are three who finished eighth, one who finished ninth, and one who finished 10th — Shii Ann Huang (Thailand), who made one of the biggest blunders in "Survivor" history when she cozied up to the wrong people at the wrong time.

Probst said the big questions in casting was "Who drove the drama?" And "Shii Ann drove a lot of the drama. . . . Shii Ann is the first person to shoot from the hip"

Not everyone they asked said yes. Elizabeth Filarski (Australia), who's now a host of the ABC daytime talker "The View," declined, as did Colleen Haskell (Borneo), who "had moved on in her life and just genuinely didn't want to go through that again. And, while Burnett said no formal invitation was issued to "Panama" winner Sandra Diaz-Twine, he did speak with her, and she made it clear she wasn't interested.

The game itself remains largely the same for "All-Stars." The show begins with contestants competing as tribes — the biggest change being that there are three tribes instead of two (and 18 contestants instead of 16). The tribe that finishes third in the weekly immunity challenge has to vote out one of its members.

Eventually, it becomes an individual competition, with the winner taking home $1 million.