Six-time Emmy nominee Alan Cumming was not the biggest fan of reality television prior to being approached to host the U.S. edition of “The Traitors.” Despite eventually taking the job that required keeping a watchful eye over alumni from such shows as “Survivor,” “Big Brother,” “The Real Housewives of Atlanta,” and “The Challenge,” and excelling to the point of a current Outstanding Host for a Reality or Reality Competition Program nomination for his work on Season 2, the Scottish star jokes, “I’m still not.”
Sitting down for an interview with IndieWire in our Los Angeles studio, Cumming recalls the rest of his “The Traitors” origin story, saying he took the meeting with producers “just to kinda see what was going on. And they said that they wanted me to play this sort of character, this sort of heightened, quite theatrical host. So I really got into the hang of it and I understood why they wanted me to do it after that.” He added, “It’s kind of a left field thing for someone like me to just suddenly be hosting a competition reality show. But I like that. I like confounding people’s expectations.”
Cumming credits his stylist Sam Specter (who also styled him for the interview) as the key figure who most helped him capture the kind of character he wanted to portray on the Peacock series also nominated for Outstanding Reality Competition Program at the 2024 Emmys. “I went to him and said all these things like Dandy Scottish laird, James Bond villain, tartan, lots of Scottish references. And then he took that and sort of ran with it,” said the cheeky host. “I just realized how much I depend on a costume designer or a stylist to get to my character. Because they’ve, to be honest, probably researched it a lot more than I have.”
Part of what made “The Traitors” Season 2 different was the decision to exclusively cast celebrities rather than mix in contestants who were not previously public figures like in the premiere season. “It meant that everyone was coming into it at concert pitch… with their shtick already. So I think it really just upped the game in terms of confidence and kind of theatricality and drama, and those are the three words that could just encapsulate the whole show,” said Cumming, who is also a producer on the series.
An even more specific change was the choice to interview the contestants prior to the ceremony determining who the titular Traitors would be, with the host revealing that the segment actually helped everyone behind the scenes finalize who he would have to then tap to start picking off the rest of the contestants known as Faithfuls. Surprisingly, that physical gesture just might be the hardest part of the gig for Cumming. “I just got little tremors thinking about it,” he said. “It’s awful because at that point, they’re all there, 20 or 21 of them or something. And so they’re pretty squashed around the table and a lot of them have got big outfits on. When I was trying to tap Phaedra [Parks] I thought, ‘Would you even feel my finger with all those shoulder pads?’” Even the control room can feel the momentary tension.
Another big contribution Cumming has made to the show as it continues to grow, with three more seasons already announced, is making sure the show casts a wide net, especially regarding queer representation. “We have to make up for lost ground and lost time in the way and the volume that queer people are seen on TV,” he said. “We are not going to change the terrible wave of hatred in this country against trans people especially, but also queer people and not the people who are in my minorities of any kind. We’re not gonna change that unless we can show them on mainstream television, so that those people who are hateful will not be scared of them anymore.”
Upon hearing that he, a long out and proud bisexual, is among the three out of five shows that have a member of the LGBTQIA+ community nominated for Outstanding Host for a Reality or Reality Competition Program, Cumming shares what he has learned from his new appreciation of the genre: “Oh my God, it’s the gayest thing ever, reality TV.”
Watch the full IndieWire interview with Alan Cumming discussing his Emmy nominated work on Peacock’s “The Traitors” Season 2 above.
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