Good news for Amazing Race’s future, and an update on Survivor casting

Both of CBS’s marquee reality series, Survivor and The Amazing Race, are in the process of casting new seasons that will likely both be filmed late this spring.

While Survivor 49’s casting is not a surprise, the show’s casting director did have news for applicants—and about Survivor seasons beyond 50.

And he had great news about The Amazing Race: While season 37 won’t start airing for another two months, casting is beginning for season 38.

Amazing Race 38 will be casting soon

You, too, can dominate The Amazing Race with your partner, as Ricky and Cesar did during The Amazing Race 36 (Photo by Kit Karzen/CBS)

The Amazing Race 37 will premiere in March, having filmed last May and June with a record number of teams.

This month, the search for TAR 38 teams will begin.

Casting director Jesse Tannenbaum—who now casts Amazing Race, Survivor, and Big Brother—filmed himself outside CBS offices, saying, “I’m about to walk into CBS and have a big meeting talking about season 39 and the casting.” That video was posted Dec. 20 on TikTok.

Casting is “starting in the new year, mid-January,” Tannenbaum said, encouraging people to “think about who you might want to race around the world with” and noting his team wants “dynamic chemistry, layers, depth,” and to know “why you want to race around the world with this specific person.”

He directs people to The Amazing Race’s casting website, which says “applications are accepted year-round.”

Its details, though, are kind of a mess, telling applicants to “refer to past seasons 1-33” and “check out the 2017 cast.” (There have been three seasons since 33 and seven seasons since the 2017 season.)

The FAQ is more up to date—and by that, I mean it was at least updated last year—saying that “Calls will be made through the end of March 2024.”

Perhaps it’ll be updated in the following weeks, as casting kicks off.

Survivor 49—and 51 and 52 news

You too could fly to Fiji and hold balls while a man shouts at you—just apply now! (Photo by Robert Voets/CBS)

Survivor now films its seasons in late spring and early summer. Season 47, for example, filmed in May and June of 2024. The application says season 49 will film “sometime between mid April, 2025 to mid May, 2025,” so a little earlier.

While filming is months away, casting is wrapping up.

Casting director Jesse Tannenbaum said in a December video that reviews of applications for season 49 began in August, and will conclude this month—five months to pick a cast!

The application doesn’t have a deadline, but Tannenbaum said—and again, this was mid-December—”we are still looking through submissions. We are still accepting submissions all the way through the new year. So the deadline to get those in will be the first week in January.”

He said “the deadline to submit these applications will be the first week in January, but we’re looking through those over the holidays.”

The show is still accepting applicants age 16 and over, though so far no one under 18 has been cast.

While rejected applicants are not notified, he told people “if you don’t get a call by the third week in January, it most likely did not work out for this season.” He encouraged those who are rejected to try again: “Look at Andy from this season. He’s applied for years and years and years and he finally got his dream.”

There’s no public casting for Survivor 50 because it will be an all-star season, a decision made after Jeff Probst suddenly decided fans should decide while standing in front of an audience in L.A. Well, just that. Nothing else.

However, later this year, future seasons will start casting newbies again: “we start casting season 51 and 52 in August,” he said.