Dr. Will hired the person he kicked off Deal or No Deal Island

I just finished interviewing Deal or No Deal Island season 2’s latest evicted player, Maria-Grace Cook, over Zoom, and during our call, she gestured to the room she was in and said, “I’m actually doing this interview at his house right now.”

I thought she was joking, pretending she was in a horror movie. After all, at the end of the episode, M.G. said, “Will is just garbage as a person. It is not just a character and an act; he truly is not a good person.”

But she was not kidding! She was actually in his house, and that’s because she now works for his company, LaserAway, which calls itself “the nation’s leading aesthetic dermatology group.”

How she got hired, and what she actually thinks of Dr. Will, are both in our conversation below, along with her revelation that she didn’t know she was in the “Family” alliance until a producer asked her about it, and why she applied to DONDI in the first place.

This interview has been edited and condensed to clean up human speech.

Andy Dehnart: Tell me first how you found your way to Deal or No Deal Island and if you were a fan of the first season, or watched it.

You apply online, and then you have to do a bunch of interviews before you get to main interviews. It’s kind of like an elimination thing. They take big groups, bring them down.

I was about halfway through the interviews—because I didn’t think I was going to get it—before I even watched the first season. Which, you know, I didn’t tell them that!

They told me, Your next one is a big interview. You need to know the characters from the first season.

I was like, Oh, I already watched it. And then the next two days, I binge-watched the first season.

It was great; I liked it. So I was excited.

What was it that drew you to even apply if you hadn’t seen it? The money, the experience, something else?

Definitely was the money. I was a full-time fireman for three years and then worked in EMS. Being a first responder, you don’t make any money, but I loved my job.

If I can make a bunch of money but still do my job and be financially stable, why not? And it was a great experience, but I was there for the money.

When you watched it, was there anything about the first season that made you think that you needed to prepare? Or did you have a strategy or idea [about] how you were going to approach it?

I hadn’t watched reality TV before, which I think that was part of my downfall. 

I thought the challenges were going to be very, very physical. I ended up getting my personal trainer back that I had to be a fireman. And I worked for like three weeks.

I had a strategic plan I was talking to my family with: to fly under the radar and not win challenges, but get safe, which I did. I was safe four out of five times.

That was my plan until just David ended up being my partner.

Parvati and Maria-Grace connect, which left Maria-Grace vulnerable (Photo by Monty Brinton/NBC)

The relationships you had seemed like [were] ultimately what led you to be voted out. We’ll talk about the Dr. Will of it all in a second, but do you think those—the relationship with Storm, being close to Parvati and David—did those, do you think, hurt you?

I didn’t know David and Parvati were as close as they were. I was really close to David. He was my number one. I was also really close with Parvati, but I didn’t know how close they were together—until, honestly, watching it back.

I never knew because when they’re showing someone else being strategizing, you’re also doing the same thing. So you’re not watching who’s strategizing. You’re also doing that. So I never know how much time they hung out. David didn’t allude to that either, because why would he?

Yeah, I think that was a little difficult. Obviously, being in “The Family” didn’t help me, which I didn’t know.

Did you even know you were in The Family? 

I didn’t know I was in the family until I did one of my confessionals and they were like, What do you think about being in The Family?

I was like, I don’t want anything to do with this family. Obviously, that wasn’t shown. But I didn’t know I was in the Family until they asked me that.

I went back and I was like, Wait, am I in The Family? They’re like, like their mom and dad thing about Storm, and I was like, oh, gosh, I’m in The Family!

The family that Dickson kept together with his win: Maria-Grace Cook, David Genat, and Parvati Shallow (Photo by Monty Brinton/NBC)

Obviously, Will went after you because you were connected to this alliance. Is there anything you could have done to save yourself in retrospect, looking back at it now?

[In the challenge], giving David the case instead of me—I didn’t know he was a Survivor player, and I even said, ironically enough, I don’t think he’s playing a very good game, which is hilarious. He offered me the case and I said no, I’m going give it to you. I thought that I was safe and he wasn’t.

I already knew Dr. Will was going to throw it because he throws all these competitions, so I knew he was going to be wanting to go against the banker because he was telling us that.

I was like, he would definitely take David over C.K.. He’s going to [send home] C.K. over me, so I need to protect my alliance. 

Let’s talk about a few other people. At the beginning of the episode, you say that Dickson is “a dumbass.” I’m curious if that was just in-the-moment, annoyance at the fact that Storm had been voted off, or is there more to the Dickson relationship? 

In hindsight, he’s a really sweet boy. He really is. He’s great. He calls me; we stay in touch, and I apologized to him last night. 

In the moment, though—he’s a weasel. He really was. He was horrible to play with and I didn’t want him as my “brother” let alone in my alliance. 

The first day we got there, he thought he was a really strategic player and he watched a lot of reality TV, and he told us all that, which was kind of strange.  He came up to everyone and said, You’re my number one, you’re my number one, you’re my number one—every single person the first day! 

By the end of the first day, we all talked to each other. In temple that night, he raised his hand was like, Joe, I want to let everyone know I lied to all of you and I apologize … but I’m going to make it up to you. From that point on, obviously I don’t like the guy.

A barely recognizable Dr. Will Kirby showed up on Deal or No Deal Island season 2, episode 2, to join the players. (Photo by Monty Brinton/NBC)

As somebody who hadn’t watched reality TV, you obviously don’t know Dr. Will coming into this.

What what was your impression of him as a just a human being who joined you—obviously in melodramatic fashion—in that second episode? What did you think about him—obviously, beyond kicking you off.

Yeah, when he got brought in, I didn’t know who he was. Truthfully, the first thing I thought was, Is he the banker? I thought the banker was a woman because he’s wearing a suit.

And then he comes on. Everyone’s like, Is that Dr. Will? Is that Dr. Will? And I was like, Who’s Dr. Will? Please tell me. And I’m begging people.

Then I see Parvati and him have a conversation, and I’m like, oh, she knows who he is. So I go talk to her later. And I’m like, who is this? She’s like, he’s the Big Brother guy.

She’s trying to explain it to me, but I still never really understood. I didn’t understand until I was kicked off and got to watch his season.

Was he just a genuine normal person around you all, and then during these challenges playing this character? Or was he that way all the time?

No, I think Parvati said it best in one of her interviews: He’s a method actor 24/7. You would not have known.

I mean, truthfully, like on camera, off camera—there’s a lot of time where you’re going on buses. You’re doing a lot of things behind the scenes to get places. He was the same 24/7. It didn’t matter.

He would be doing the same antics. Is he doing this just for show? But there’s no cameras. He would be like taking his shirt off randomly and like laying on the ground and doing crazy stuff.

He’s very, very good at his art, because he embodies it the whole time. Then right after filming, when everything wrapped and we’re about to head home, he’s like, Hey, I’m actually a nice guy.

And you’re like, what? Like, it makes no sense. It’s actually really creepy.

In an interview or confessional, you called him “garbage as a person.” Has that impression changed since he dropped that facade after filming? Are you texting and BFFs with him now, too?

Funny enough, I’m actually doing this interview at his house right now.

He gave me a job at his company. He offered me a job, and I didn’t think he was going to—he offered it to me before I got on my plane to go home.

I’m from a small town, and I talked to him a lot about that on the island because no one would talk to this man. I wouldn’t say we were friends, but I was just keeping him busy.

And I talked to him about how I was trying to transition out of the fire service and trying to make more money and things like that. He was like, I have a really successful company. Just come work for me, and I’ll move you to L.A.

Two weeks after I got home, I didn’t hear anything from him. Then he put me in an e-mail with some of the execs for his company and was like, We need to get her an interview. She’s going to work here now.

I flew out and stayed with him and his family. Then two weeks later after that, I moved here.

Wow!  What are you doing for the company?

It’s a patient care coordinator. So I do sales, aesthetic sales. So if anybody needs anything for laser hair removal, reach out to me!

Obviously, you weren’t able to even go for the prize at the end, but [you said] you’d hoped for it to transform your life. I’m curious how you intended to use it.

Actually, I’ve never had that question. My plan was my childhood home that I grew up in—that I still lived in. I’m 22 years old and I lived in that same exact room in my same exact street my whole entire life up until I moved to Los Angeles about four months ago. 

My parents were having to sell it and I wanted to buy it from them, remodel it, and grow my kids up in it in the same area. It was like a sweet moment—we wanted to keep it in the family but they were having to sell it. So I was going to use the money to do that.

It was going to transform my life just because memories—you can’t make memories like old memories. But now my life has changed, I think for the better.

I don’t know if I would change anything from the game strategically, just because I would have never moved to Los Angeles. My eyes have been open to so many different things, culture, food, friends, like friends that are like family now.

So it’s different. It’s not the dream I wanted, but it is a dream.