I’ve been an Amazing Race superfan for years. I’ve actually seen every U.S. season of the series. I’ve followed the contestant drama. I know about how contestants get that million dollar prize. I usually know about newer twists in advance of new seasons. Yet, I just learned more about The Amazing Race rules from Kaitlin Olson in one video than I’ve learned in literal years of watching the show.
And I learned all this because of Hacks.
I assume you know Katilin Olson has not appeared on a traditional season of The Amazing Race, though some celebrity names like Mike White have. Instead, the final season of Hacks features a very memorable episode in which DJ (Olson) convinces her mom Deborah (Jean Smart) to compete on a celebrity edition of The Amazing Race with her. I've long wanted a celebrity edition of Race, but there are some obstacles to making it fully happen. Getting it this way was cathartic to me.
Anyway, they get eliminated early, but Olson recently admitted the show actually hired real crew members from the reality series in order to make sure they got the details right, which squares with similar comments the Hacks writing team has made. She told Awards Buzz:
Listen, that was something that was very important to them was making this very authentic. So, you see the camera person, the cameraman and the boom operator following us around, and those were Amazing Race crew. They wanted it to be very realistic.
So, she really did got schooled on some of the TAR rules, including a few I didn't know about.
The Fanny Pack Must Stay In Front
The actress went on to say she “does not” want to join basically any of the best reality shows after her Hacks experience, but she did learn a lot. That includes things like clue placement and where fanny packs must go.
We had very specific instructions, which I loved. Tell me exactly how, what’re you supposed to do with the envelope? Can I throw it on the ground afterwards? Do I hold onto it? Like the fanny pack can’t [go in] the back, it’s in the front, like great.
While she doesn’t give us the answer to the envelope thing, they usually stick the clue back in the fanny pack and refer back to it throughout the race. I’m pretty sure throwing the clue on the ground and littering would be frowned on, but I had no idea about this fanny pack thing!
You Can’t Say “Fuck You” To Host Phil Keoghan
The second thing Olson mentioned was a bit of improv she attempted to include in the episode, which would have involved getting aggressive with host Phil Keoghan. Turns out, that’s a big no-no.
At the end, after the clown dance, when I screw it up, I screamed, ‘Fuck you Phil!’ And they were like, ‘Stop, no. One thing you can’t do is say ‘fuck you’ to Phil. I was like, ‘Cool, cool, cool.’ Let’s do it again.
Phil's got a squeaky clean image, and The Amazing Race airs on network TV, so this entire thing squares away. But I do think the image of the actress going so over-the-top as a fake contestant is very funny, and would have played for shock value. That is, if it totally hadn't been against the rules.
