'Survivor 47's Kyle Ostwald Says Sue Was 'Never Ugly' to Him to His Face

Survivor 47 is here! Every week, Parade.com's Mike Bloom will bring you interviews with the castaway most recently voted off of the island.

"When I give it, I give it a buck 20. And I do it for my family." This quote from Kyle Ostwald shortly into the postmerge is a great microcosm of almost three weeks of gameplay. The residential contractor had a heart as big as all outdoors, which he poured into everything from camp life to challenges to relationships. And, perhaps with one exception, Kyle became one of the most well-liked people in the game, seen as both genuine and genial. Unfortunately for Kyle, it got to a point where his desire to put his all into everything worked to his detriment. He strung together an impressive competitive streak, winning the most Immunity Challenges out of anyone in the new era. But that unfortunately labeled him as one of the biggest threats in the game. And so Kyle's desire to give it "a buck 20" sent him out on Day 20, with smiles and hugs on the way out.

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Despite a hefty amount of experience in construction, Kyle soon found out the strategic structure of his hopefully-million-dollar game lacked solid materials. He not only lost his closest ally Terran "TK" Foster in the first Tribal Council he went to, but he was also left out of the vote. While Kyle was devastated, his sadness was nothing compared to the ire of Sue Smey, who began her long-term crusade against him after he wrote her name down. Despite never going back to Tribal Council for the rest of the premerge, Kyle still entered the individual game in a far-from-safe spot. While the Tukus were a solid bloc, he was definitively on the bottom of it. He had lost his vote from an early journey. And, most pertinently, Rome Cooney had begun a crusade against him, after an attempt to use Kyle's words to sow distrust among his allies bounced back against Rome himself.

Perhaps it was the feeling of being backed against the wall. Perhaps it was his natural physical prowess. Or perhaps it was the happenstance tattoo of a bat on his back. But the postmerge kicked off with Kyle winning individual immunity. He would repeat the gesture three more times, setting a record for the new era and keeping him invulnerable through the various power shifts. However, as Kyle himself said, what made him safe today made him more vulnerable tomorrow. To Sue's chagrin, despite Kyle constantly being a target, he was able to stay out of the fray through wearing the necklace, and even helped draw Tuku blood when he joined in on the vote against Gabe Ortis. But he was unable to join the five-timers club when he lost a crucial challenge, immediately thrusting him on the chopping block. The new majority alliance argued about whether Kyle's game being more imbalanced than a wobbly table looming larger as a threat than his contemporaries. Regardless, they ultimately settled on giving Kyle the boot as, through the disappointment, he embraced his competition, thanking them for their companionship through his first major trip away from home.

Now out of the game, Kyle talks with Parade.com about his mysterious vote for Teeny on the way out, his reaction to Sue's comments about him, and his difficulty in separating emotions and gameplay.

Related: Read our Survivor 47 pre-game interview with Kyle Ostwald

So your boot didn't seem like a shock to us or you. There's even one point at Tribal Council where you laugh at someone saying the vote won't be a pile-on. The biggest mystery to take away from that night, though, was your vote for Teeny. Was it part of a hopeful plan, or just a throwaway vote?
So this thing with Teeny, which is kind of interesting, it didn't make the cut. But Teeny is awesome. I'm going to start right now with Teeny is awesome. And I love Teeny. I think she's a superhuman and I'm so thankful that I get to call her a friend for the rest of my life. Teeny likes to gossip; she likes to talk. That's just what she likes to do, and that's okay. But the problem with that, for me, was that I did this little bait and hook thing. I was like, "I feel like somebody around here is leaking all this information constantly. I don't know how all this information is [getting out]. I'm only telling select people, and all this information is everywhere so quick."  And so I was like, "Well, last time I said something about Caroline, she came to me relatively quickly." So I told Teeny something. Next thing you know, here comes Caroline ten minutes later. "Kyle, did you say this?" Ah, okay, so there's my leak!

So before I got voted out, one of my money plans was to inform people that we're getting into this end game, and you need to be able to keep a tight alliance. And if there's somebody running around camp that's leaking your vital information, this is going to be a liability to your endgame. It's going to be tough for you to navigate these waters when there's a constant leak in your boat. So I was just what I was doing. Man, Mike, I was just throwing. I was hoping that I was throwing and it would stick somewhere, and it didn't. So my goal was to go for Teeny because that was my best idea. Somebody leaking a lot of information to other people. And I was hoping that would be unsettling and get people to run my way for one more vote. But it didn't. And it is what it is. So, if you will, [it's] a throwaway vote. But it was my Hail Mary. I'm like, "I don't even know where to throw this ball right now. I don't even have a Shot in the Dark in my pocket. Everybody's coming after me, respectively." It is what it is. 

To that point about talking to others about their endgame, let's say Genevieve had gone over you. Did you have any relationships you were hoping to cultivate to get to the end? Or would you have just been out on a metaphoric island with the goal of winning every immunity?
This is great. I'm so happy that you hit this. Because I had this immunity streak. And I'm a Survivor fan, but I'm not a diehard "know everything about this show" super fan, like 90% of people that were on that rock with me. And so I knew that these people, when I seen and heard of different threats there, it was going to be meaningful. It was not going to just be just dust in the air, just people talking smack. They have an idea. They've seen something, and it's alerting them. It's throwing a red flag. And when I went on this immunity streak, there was this challenge where we were holding the bar above our head and balancing a ball. And it's been kind of controversial whether or not I should have even brought home that individual necklace myself. When, in fact, if you look at it, we were split tribes or split teams at this point. But ultimately, Genevieve and Teeny would have taken that necklace if it was an individual run.

But they continue to throw this target on me like I was that threat. And sure I had won a couple individual things, or I stood out a little bit more in in challenges and things like this. But when I started seeing that, there were other people capable of beating me in challenges, but it was being overlooked constantly. There was no point in even trying to put that fire out like that. It was more just work on your social game and keep winning as much as you can. Because if you're losing these challenges to these people, when it's obvious that other people could have beat you in those challenges, then it's it is what it is. And that comes into play even at my demise right before I get voted out, when Rachel beats me. Inidividually, I've been beaten by Teeny, I've been beaten by Genevieve, and I've been beaten by Rachel. I didn't tip that ball off that handle, because I'm like, "Okay, I'm good enough now." That wasn't why I did that. I failed at that point. I went as hard as I could go, and that was the end of it. So, like I said, once I started realizing that people were painting targets on me, [that] they painting me out to be this person, these Survivor enthusiasts already had an image of what they wanted me to be. And that wasn't going to change.

Let's get into some of these relationships. We need to start with Sue, because she seems to hold a grudge against you for voting against her that only magnifies as the game goes on. From our perspective, it's very one-sided. Was that not the case? Were you aware of the way she was feeling about you on the island?
Alright, I'm gonna start off with Sue was not ugly to me on the island. There was a couple of moments where she was not willing to work with me, didn't want to talk strategies to me a certain way. So, it was very obvious of where Sue stood and what what morals and values she was going to carry through the game. So it was up to me to understand where to hold those values and to see what kind of player she was and what kind of momentum she was going to carry in the game and decide whether or not I was going to let that affect me. And what I personally observed, in my own opinion, [I'd] seen not much momentum coming from her as a player. It was more like I was letting the Chihuahua bark at the hills, right? It was just like, "Whatever, do your thing. If you want to be angry, be angry. If you want to hyper-fixate on Kyle the entire time that you're out here, here you go. You're welcome." But she was kind to me on the island for the most part. If I asked her to hand me my water bottle across the fire or something like that, she would happily do. We sang Happy Birthday to her daughter on the island, Chelsea. We had a lot of fun together.

But that's also one of the concerning things. I didn't see all that ugly, none of that was present to me until I start seeing these interviews, and start seeing all the stuff behind my back. And that's where I start raising my flags. Because I didn't say stuff like that in my interviews. The closest thing I came to is, I'm sure you've heard I referred to a couple of players on the season as "Tweedledee and Tweedledum." That's come to light, and I'm going to stop right there. And I'm also going to highlight the fact that if you're ill-educated, that sounds like an attack. If you are educated, you will understand that the definition of this is two people alike. It's not an attack.

What that is is me identifying two players in the game. They will not vote for one another, and they will only vote the same direction. To me, these two people seem alike, very much so. And so that was about as ugly as I went in the show. And so I feel like if you did not understand that definition, that was very easy to be taken as a blow. If you would have understood that definition, it could have irritated you. But I don't think it would have dug as deeply as as what it did dig on some people. So it's tough, right? Because, like I said, I didn't talk a lot of nasty things. I didn't say things. I wasn't out to get nobody. I didn't hyper-fixate on one individual. I played my own game the whole way through. And I didn't give a lot of room for people to pick on me for different things, because I was just very genuine. I was very open; I was very honest. And those couple of little moments that I had where people were like, "Whoa, "and started to feel a little bit offended, that that fire that raged inside of them burned out of control. And it was gaining the attention way more than it was me that was just like this quiet little ember on the side.

To that point, let's talk about another point of clarification. During his exit press, Rome had said that you "just said something about Caroline and Sue that was a little bit outside of the game. It didn't make the cut for probably obvious reasons, but I wasn't going to work with somebody like that. If I would've repeated that, I'd get canceled. I'd never say any of those things ever again and never host anything ever again." Was that the Tweedledee and Tweedledum comment, or something else?
I'm going to be very brief about this, because Rome had his moment. What he did was he gave the world a cheesy ass Mad Lib, and y'all were filling it in. That's that's all I did. I've been very open with everything that I've said, and if "Battle Rap Rome" can't say Tweedledee and Tweedledum or he'll get canceled, whatever. Dude, I don't care. Move on. I'm being portrayed as this person. Rome's out of the game at this point. He's continued to watch me in the game gain momentum. His torch has been snuffed. He's watching it back, and now we're in the real world. And this is when he decides to start making these comments and these things. And so what he did was genius. I mean, what he did was he took somebody that was being genuine, somebody that was being honest, that the people like and can relate with you. And he left a question that only your mind could fill in with the expect of whatever your mind's capacity is. It could be the ugliest thing in the world. It could be the gentlest thing in the world. He let your mind do the work for you. It was a great tactic, but it's burnt out.

When you found out Rome had been spreading the information you told him, we actually saw you become really angry for the first time in the game. Talk to me about your reaction to that.
I told you the truth! I told you everything! I was hoping to work with him. So this didn't catch too good. This is good. The world will love this. So we got along pretty good, being the fact that we were on separate tribes. When I looked at him, he looked at me. I felt connection. I wanted to work with Rome. I liked Rome. When we went on the journey together with Anika, I got [on] with Rome good. He had great energy. I loved him. He smiled a lot,  a lot to like there. And so when we went on the journey, we were telling each other beforehand, "I'm going to tell you if I got something." The next challenge, the water challenge, where we had to jump off the high spot, dive across the balance beam, put together the seahorse, if you notice, Rome and I are the two first people out the gate. Rome was not going to [initially] be the first person out the gate. We had unfinished business. We make it through. We hit the end platform, and I look at Rome, and he looks at me, and he smiles. And I said, "You get it?" He said, "I got it. You get it?" I said, "No." He said, "You lose two?" I said, "One."

So at that point, I thought I had some working relationship with Rome. This was a way that him and I had some inside [information] together. So when we hit the island together, I was like, "I'm going to tell Rome everything." I'm having a hard time trusting these people. I feel like Sue and Caroline are attached to Gabe's hip. I need somebody in my corner, and I need them fast. Why not Rome? I have connections with him. So I told him everything. Within 10 minutes, the whole island already knew everything that I just told Rome. So yeah, when, when I was being confronted and asked about these things, I just had to smile. I looked right at Sol and said, "What a dick!" [Laughs.] I just gave you the key to the city, and you just threw it away for what I think was a poor decision. I think he should have rode with me. And I think that maybe there was a little bit of regret there, and there was maybe some masking that he tried to do.

Speaking of regrets, talk to me about your relationship with Gabe. You seemed to be on opposite sides of Tuku, though you also were set up to be his future limo driver. You clearly struggled to target him, though you eventually do vote him out. What made you decide to do that, and how do you look back on that decision?
[To start], this is leading back all the way to, we were on Lavo's beach. After one of those challenges, Gabe, myself, Tiyana, we all ended up on Lavo beach with Rachel. We were fixing to head to a Tribal cCuncil after this, it was about that point where I was trying to understand when to get Gabe. Not that I was trying to really put it in motion, but I was trying to throw the bait out there and see who wanted to get them and when. Because I knew that if I were to ever swing at Gabe, it needed to stick. Because I really felt like Gabe is a genuinely awesome person, and it was picked up and perceived that way from everybody on the island. So I knew, once people got in cahoots with Gabe, it was going to be a tough cookie to crumble. So I was like, "I needed to keep my options open." And when I found the opportunity where I could strike Gabe, that's when I needed to make the decision on whether or not I wanted to let that actually happen. And so the suspense was building up at this point. And I had the immunity at this point, but we had just had a challenge where Gabe beat me in a challenge where I thought I could beat Gabe. So then it was like, "Gabe's a physical threat all of a sudden. He just beat me in something." And the last time when Gabe beat me and I didn't have that immunity, it was a miracle I made it through a Tribal Council. I couldn't let that happen again.

So when I finally had the opportunity to swing at Gabe, I took it. But I was more like a swing vote on it when I was taking this shot. And I went to Gabe, and I gave him the benefit of the doubt before everything went down as a brother, as a teammate, as a tribemate. And I told him, "Gabe, it's not looking good. I'm telling you right now, if you got something in your pocket, it needs to come out tonight, or you're out." I told him as clear as day. Because [he was] somebody I would be willing to go to the end with. He was one of the toughest players out there. That's what I wanted in the end game. So I'm willing to take it the distance. But the shadier he gets–the more active he gets in the game, the harder he's playing the game, the things that I'm less and less able to pick up on–that becomes threatening to me at this point. I don't know where to hold that, because now it starts to feel sneaky against me. I don't feel that brotherly code anymore. And so that's when I draw the line. I'm like, "Alright, I'm going to let you know, if the Survivor gods are smiling upon you, you're in. We're going the distance. But if you don't, you're going home." And to this day, Gabe and I are really [good]. As far as I know, every time I've seen him, any of our interactions [are] very positive, very brotherly. Like he said, If Gabe called me today and he needed something, my ass would be on an airplane headed to Gabe now.

When it came to that Gabe vote, you talked about the difficulty you had in separating your emotions from the game. Even in our preseason chat, you said that your kryptonite would be not causing people distress. Talk to me about your struggle in doing that. And would you be able to be more duplicitous if you were given the chance to play again?
Oh, I think it'd be much easier the next the next time around. When going back into the game, I would be able to approach it differently. I have a little more experience. I've touched the fire, I've been burnt. I've understood a little bit of of what's happening, you know? And when I talk about separating those emotions from the game, I'm going to highlight this very well. And this is TK's vote very early in the game. TK is one of my absolute favorite humans on Earth ever ever ever. I love TK so much. And I knew TK was going home. I fed Tiyana this line by the water well. I was like, "What do you think about a TK blindside?" And her reaction was going to let me know where I needed to stand in the tribe. Tiyana lit up. She was excited. Tiyana, myself, and TK were supposed to be tight. She should not have been excited when I brought this up. At this point, I got concerned, and I knew TK was on his way out. Because Tiyana was in with the girls. Gabe owned the girls. It is what it is.

So what I did was I posted a vote with TK against Sue, knowing TK was going home. Because I didn't want tk to go home alone. Everybody was against him early in the game. His journey just got clipped. Everybody that he put faith in, shared personal stories with, opened up with–I could tell that he was a little uncomfortable, but he still let me in anyway. I wasn't about to let him burn like that. So I wanted him to feel like there was somebody with him, and I was willing to stand there with him on his way out. But what that did was it damaged me in the game. You can see that with the grudge that was held against me by Sue through the entire game that burnt me. So later on in the game, I learned that I could not be voting for people, and I couldn't be voting in a way that was helping people that were leaving the game. That was just going to destroy me. That was part of myself in the real world that I needed to put on the back burner. I needed to evolve into a better Survivor player, and I needed to be able to separate those emotions and those ideas from the actual game to the point where, when my votes happened, it put me in a better motion forward with the people that I was going to wake up the next day with. And then if I do have good relationships with you, if we did have a connection, you'll understand, and we will meet up in the outside world, and we will become family again.

Related: 'Survivor 47's Gabe Ortis Says He May Have Flipped on His Tuku Alliance If He Survived