‘Deal or No Deal Island’ champ on ‘incredible’ $5.8 million record win, and why they ‘related’ to new Banker Chrissy Teigen
Welcome to Reality Derby, our weekly deep dive into all things reality TV, hosted by Gold Derby senior editors Marcus James Dixon and Denton Davidson.
Joining us this week is David Genat, the winner of Deal or No Deal Island Season 2, who set a new game-show record for American television by winning $5.8 million during the March 25 finale. The self-proclaimed "Golden God" was already well-known to fans of Australian Survivor, having won All Stars and played on Champions v Contenders, before he joined up with the NBC competition. Watch our video interview above.
"It's incredible," David says about his history-making performance. "When I started this journey of doing reality shows and you're playing for big money, I never dreamed that I would play for this amount of money and get a chance to win this amount of money. It's so far beyond the scope of what I envisage to myself. So it's been really, really intense."
David admits he was "calm" during the final temple when he played for millions of dollars. "I was having a very spiritual experience out there," he recalls. "I was feeling really connected to my dad, who passed a few years prior, and to God, and I just felt very spiritually driven when all that was happening. And I actually knew where that $12.2 [million case] was. I felt like I knew [briefcase] seven had the money in it. So I had made peace with the fact I was going to accept $5.8 [million], and I was thinking through all these different scenarios and how I would like this to go and want it to happen."
SEE ‘Deal or No Deal Island’ Season 2 cast photos, spoilers, boot list
"I love making television," David continues. "I'm a television character at my heart." Two other personalities that made headlines this season were his "family" alliance members, Parvati Shallow and Dickson Wong, who finished in fourth place and sixth place, respectively. (Watch our video interview with Parvati.) The runner-up was Alexis Lete, and third place went to Courtney “CK” Kim.
Was David worried that his true identity as an Australian Survivor winner would hurt him with his relationships on DONDI, particularly with Dickson? "Yeah, definitely," he notes. "But it was one of these things where I was going to turn it around to be a positive thing where I'm like, 'Look, wasn't that cool that I was able to do that? Doesn't that show I deserve to win this game? I am skillful, man!'"
The new Banker on Season 2 was Chrissy Teigen, who used to be a briefcase model on the original Deal or No Deal game show. "She models, she knows what that's about, so I really related well to Chrissy," says the Australian male supermodel. "I think it was funny because the Banker is supposed to be really staunch, like, 'You suck David.' She's just such a nice person and it was really funny seeing her up there trying be staunch and mean and stuff."
What does the future have in store for David? "I definitely want to make other shows," he tells us. "I think the luxury of this money is I get to kind of pick and choose them now. I just want to have fun now. So if I get fun projects put in front of me, I'm doing it and I'll say no to the ones I don't want to do." He would "love" to do The Traitors and jokes that he's "a very honest player, so I think I'd be the greatest Faithful of all time."
For the record, David's total of $5.8 million now puts him ahead of the Jeopardy! trio of Ken Jennings ($5,296,214), Brad Rutter ($5,153,436), and James Holzhauer ($3,772,549) on the all-time list of American game show winners.
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