The Summit premiered with a bang — and the ultimate blindside — on Sunday, May 14, when Stephen Butler was left hanging out to dry by his fellow Trekkers.
After reaching a bridge on the second day of the climb, the father-of-two drew the short straw when the Mountain’s Keeper tasked them with the “ultimate sacrifice”. The Brisbane-local entered the bridge last, before Isaac Compton wielded an axe cutting the rope in what Butler called a “sliding doors” moment.
“I kicked myself coming off,” he told Mediaweek in an interview prior to his elimination. “I was the first one there but then allowed Brooke [Kilowsky] to read out the note and she said, ‘Well, I’ll be the person who is going to run it’. It was like a sliding doors moment because I would have been the first one across and away I went.”
Stephen Butler. Nine
Butler’s elimination was nothing short of brutal. After being set free, the other Trekkers were shown walking away as he dangled above a deep crevice and even though The Summit team pulled him back via a rig, he was determined not to go home.
“They [the other contestants], obviously they knew it was coming and not me,” he said. “So I sort of got wound back to where I started. In terms of clarity of mind and what was going on, at that point I had it in my head, ‘What do I need to do here?’ because I thought they were just going to say, ‘Okay, well, you can now pave your own way.’”
The Trekkers had no idea what they were in for
According to the sock designer, the cast were only “drip-fed” information about what the show was actually about.
“We were thrown in to the deep end,” he said. “And because you were only drip fed tiny bits of information… I mean, the premise was, you have two weeks to get to the top of a mountain to win a million dollars and then we met Jai [Courtney] and he gave it some context. And then it was like, ‘Off you go, guys.’”
Of course, not being given much information was a well-thought out plan for the producers, because what transpired was Survivor-style gameplay and according to Butler, it meant that there were “strategic players” from the get-go.
“I think realistically speaking, this is a game and it’s to be played and you have to be strategic,” he said.
While some players relied on their logic, others played on their physical strength, separating the weakest links from the pack.
“Kudos to them,” he said before adding: “But I still felt like there were probably some people that back themselves in terms of fitness ability that got left wanting.”
The Trekkers, The Summit. Nine
There was a sense of “camaraderie” in the group
While it certainly didn’t look this way on TV, Butler did say that most of the group rallied around each other.
“I felt like there was a strong sense of camaraderie,” he said. “But that divide, there was probably camaraderie between those that were a little bit naive compared to the ultimate game players. From the rules that we had to play, you’re only as strong as your weakest link, so you have to make sure to get everyone around you.”
And for cast members like Sam Molineux (one of the more fit in the group) being on The Summit was about getting to the top of the mountain.
“For someone like Sam, the thought of just getting to the top, it wouldn’t have mattered if he did it for free. Sam would have just wanted to get to the top and he would have just said, ‘I will carry those that I need to over the line because that’s just what I do.’”
Sam Molineux. Nine
As for Butler, he went on the show because he felt he had “something to prove”.
“I’ve got my young son down in Armidale who lives with his mum and I wanted for him to see me in a light where he was like, ‘You know what? My dad’s on TV,’” he said. “[It shows that] you’re quite integral, you’re quite competitive, you have a laugh, a lot of things that I want to and can’t showcase to him everyday.”
The Summit continues on Monday, May 15 at 7.30 pm on 9 and 9Now.