The Masked Singer Australia is back, bigger and better than ever! B&T spoke with legendary host Osher Gunsberg and Paramount’s head of lifestyle programs, Tamara Simonaeu about the making of the show and got a behind the scenes scoop that you won’t want to miss.
The Masked Singer Australia releases tonight, 11th of September at 7.30pm on 10 And 10 Play. In our interview, Gunsberg revealed the glorious details of how singers run around in Obi Wan Kenobi garb between sets and the distressing costume we might find the presenter in.
B&T: The Masked Singer franchise exists all over the world, how is Masked Singer Australia different?
Osher Gunsberg: I think our relationship with celebrity, the reverence that we have, around people in the public eye is different.
We’d be able to very honestly say things about a person who’s potentially out of the mask in front of us that you wouldn’t get in other countries.
We are a country of people who just have a bit of a go. So we end up with people that otherwise you wouldn’t think would get out of the mask, get out of the mask.
B&T: There’s always pressure with these types of shows to be bigger and better each year. How will The Masked Singer Australia measure up to expectations this year?
Tamara Simonaeu: Well, it’s always about casting, you have to go bigger, go searching in completely different places for an amazing cast of people. So we think that we’ve done that. We’ve got a really incredible cast that will just blow people’s minds as they are revealed one by one.
B&T: How do you go about the process of casting people for the show?
TS: We run through people that we might have approached last year, who have said I might do it next year. Give me a year.
We then go through to random places to see if certain people have a secret singing voice that nobody knows about. And then we go to the biggest stars in the world. So our job is to convince the biggest music stars to sing in a crazy bonkers mask and hide their faces when they have spent their living showing their faces.
And then we just find those more random celebrities with the secret singing voices and convince them to, again put on a crazy bonkers mask and sing in front of the whole country!
B&T: How do people react when you ask them to be on The Masked Singer?
TS: Well there are people that have just said, absolutely not. And then there are people to whom I’ve said, “How about you just think about it for 24 hours? And I don’t accept your absolutely not.” And then sometimes that works, they come back with, “Okay, I’m thinking about it.” And when someone tells you they’re thinking about it, they are absolutely going to do it. Because they are so intrigued. And then when they do it, they have the most incredible time. And usually it ends in tears, happy tears.
It’s going behind the scenes of something that’s just so unique, you know, they then have to live this whole secret life for a month. And then keep a massive secret for however many months it takes between when the show’s finished being shot and when it’s on air. So these people have kept an almighty secret for quite a while now. And I’m sure they’ve been waiting for it to be revealed.
Once the promo start going on imagine you’re sitting at home with family. And then that’s you in a mask and only you know that’s you.
B&T: And how do they keep it a secret from everyone?
OG: I don’t know that detail. I can’t speak to the details of the system of how we keep them secret because it is kept secret from me. Because I would otherwise talk about it. I can tell you that I only really see them onstage in the mask. Occasionally, I will see them walk by if their mask is too big to travel to the studio and they wear like some just gigantic Obi Wan Kenobi smoke.
B&T: This year we have Blue Bottle, Grim Reaper, Snow Fox, Cow Girl -so many exciting characters. Who’s your favourite?
OG: There’s a couple. I think the singers who manage to really bring a personality to them are the ones who have the most fun with it.
Julia Morris’s kitten just fit, and she loved it, she would make little kitten noises up on stage standing next to me and it was hilarious.
This season Grim Reaper is so good. And the way the Grim Reaper embodies the character, it’s really great and it comes off to the crowd.
B&T: The Masked Singer Australia is very much a family show, are there any other audiences you are trying to target?
TS: Yeah, I think at the sweet spot it is a family show, because that’s actually a really hard thing to achieve. Attracting a full family that’s engaged is actually not as easy as it might sound.
We’re all about watching our different screens in different parts of the house. We all divide up. Because we all consume things so differently. And not many shows actually bring everyone back to the same room to watch together. So just getting the family together in a room to watch a show I think is quite a feat. And I think we do that.
B&T: Times have changed. I can’t remember the last time I sat down with my family and watched something. I think it might have been the FIFA Women’s World Cup. And it was just beautiful. Because I hadn’t done that in forever.
TS: There’s a whole generation of kids that probably haven’t done it ever. And you’re right. Maybe the first time was the World Cup. And there was a time when it was very normal for the whole family to sit and watch a show together. And that’s long passed, but there’s actually something beautiful and joyous about it. So I think you know, we’re pretty proud of that.
B&T: So why do you think people are so obsessed with the Masked Singer? What’s the magic?
TS: Magic is the family thing. The magic is the guessing as well. I don’t think there’s any other show where you have to go into your own work and you research and get really invested in your conviction of who is behind that mask and something that again, you can discuss the next day at work. You’re discussing online, you’re having a chat about it online, back and forth, and you can hear different things and then you know, everybody loves being right at the end of the day. Saying “Yeah, I was right. I knew it!”. It’s very satisfying.
B&T: Osher, if we were to find you hidden behind a mask, what would your character be?
OG: A gigantic blister pack of selective serotonin re-uptake inhibitors, with only two left.
B&T: That’s very specific
OG: It is and anyone who’s just read that will be like, I know what that feels like.
B&T notes to the uneducated that a gigantic blister pack of selective serotonin re-uptake inhibitors, is an anti-depressant.
