'Survivor 45' star J Maya reacts to being called out by Kaleb at Tribal Council (2024)

J Maya did not have a single vote cast against her at Tribal Council this week on Survivor 45. And yet she was also voted out unanimously. That's because the 24-year-old singer became the first ever victim of the Shot in the Dark after Kaleb Gebrewold — who was unanimously voted out in the first round — successfully pulled the "Safe" scroll.

That meant Kaleb had immunity, and after another round of voting, J Maya became the person unanimously voted-out. It was a rough way to go for J Maya, whose two big moves of going for an advantage amulet and lying about voting for Sifu both appeared to backfire.

What does the player make of being directly called out by Kaleb at Tribal Council? Does she regret going for the amulet and taking the blame for the Sifu vote? And what happened to turn the tide against her during that live Tribal? We asked J Maya all that and more. You can watch the entire interview above or read it below.

ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: So, let's start here. What's going through your mind when Kaleb calls you out by name at Tribal Council?

J MAYA: I would say the first thing that goes through my mind is, "Okay, we're doing this." Because at that point in the day, it was not really a huge secret both of our names had been thrown out aggressively. Maybe going into Tribal Council, I thought that there was going to be a little bit more subterfuge. I'd only been to one Tribal previously and we'd spoken a lot in subtext at that one. And it was like "Great, this is what's going to happen. We're just going to see how this goes when we speak openly and plainly in front of everyone."

And so the first thing I say is, "That's very interesting Kaleb." And I'm formulating my argument immediately because I know that he's a great player and he's going to do what great players do and try to persuade people to vote with him. And I'm already thinking of my rebuttal. I grew up doing debate. That was where I felt most comfortable was in a debate room. So I felt like it was a debate and this was the time to let my argumentative side shine a little bit. But a part of me was enthralled. I was like, "This is why we all did Survivor, for a Tribal like this."

When Kaleb's safe scroll first came up, did you know you were in trouble?

Absolutely. Well, I knew I was in trouble going into that Tribal, and I knew I was in trouble during that Tribal, and I was waiting for Jeff to show that scroll. And I remember thinking "Five in six chance, this goes fine. One in six chance, you're going home tonight." And I don't know what it is. Sometimes you call it like a gut feeling. I had a feeling about that Shot in the Dark, but I dismissed it as irrationality. And it's always a sign to trust your gut feeling.

Well, that's the question that some people will ask is: Why didn't someone just throw a hinky vote at someone? So did you ever think, "Let me just put my vote on Emily just in case?"

Absolutely. And it's one of those game time decisions that haunts you after you leave the game. I've thought about that every single night, every iteration: What if I put this person's name down? What if I put this person's name down? And I think it just boils down to calculated risk taking.

I'm really glad that they included that segment in the Tribal Council where Jeff asks me, "Okay, well, what happens when you hear your name?" Do you go and scramble to make someone else the name that's being thrown out? Or do you take the L, so to speak, and hope that that's a calculated risk and you're not actually going home tonight and that your cool under pressure pays dividends at the next Tribal Council because people know that they can trust you — that any alliances that aren't a hundred percent formulated might just shift into place after you show this calmness under pressure during a Tribal Council.

And so that was what I was trying to do. I was just, at the end of the day, a little too scared to rock the boat. And I think that's a good kind of summation of where my gameplay goes south.

You were pitching Emily before the revote. Why her, and did you feel in the moment people were on board with that?

Well, I will say that in that moment, my brain is a little discombobulated. I don't know if I'm really clearly thinking every single thing out at that point. It is a Hail Mary. I don't know why I thought that she would be someone people would rally for at the last minute. I think maybe I'd heard her name a couple of times on the beach, so I was just going back to people with what I'd heard. I felt like maybe that was a safer pitch. But I knew that it was a Hail Mary, and I think truthfully at that point it was just whatever name I had heard that day, that was not me that was eligible to go home.

Let's roll it back a few episodes. Dee votes for Sifu, yet you decide to take the blame because you all think he has an idol and you want to make him comfortable so he doesn't use it. How worried were you about that strategy creating an enemy in the game, as we later saw Sifu at the winners feast throwing your name out there and throwing it hard?

Oh, a hundred percent. I think it's important to clarify, I never told Sifu that I voted for him. I think the plan that was being formulated was that if we go to Tribal Council — if it's desperate and we were worried about Sifu having an idol and were worried he's going to play it — I can go to him to try to convince him that he shouldn't play his idol and that I'm on the outs and try to apologize for putting his name down to make that happen. But I never was planning to proactively tell him unless we'd gone to Tribal Council.

I think there was a mistake made, and that gave an opening then for other people to say that I was going to do it, because they probably knew that I wouldn't negate it. But I never went and told him that because I didn't want to introduce that hole in the game at that point. I tried to work with Sifu at original Reba, and I totally get how sometimes some of these smaller elements of gameplay don't necessarily make the cut because there are just so many dynamics to cover in even 90 minutes. I truthfully, totally, totally understand that. But in the original days of Reba, there is a very important conversation where I go to Sifu and I say, "Hey, the way that the cards are shaking out, you and me should stick together in this game." We do the whole pinky swear alliance making situation. I forget the name of the alliance. It has to do with music, obviously.

And immediately after this conversation, Sifu goes and tells other people at Reba that I want him out of the game. And I take this as a sign that Sifu does not want to work with me. Sifu is throwing my name out from day one on the beach as someone that he thinks the tribe can unanimously vote out. And so now for the rest of my gameplay, this is a factor that I have to take into account. And obviously it comes up many times because then we swap and I'm swapping again with Sifu still on Reba.

So that is a big part of my game that I try to work with him and it doesn't pan out. And that I think goes again back to the decision with the decoy vote at the swap. I truthfully thought that the only way we could get Sifu to not play his now I know non-existent idol was if he believed that I was the one who put his name down and that the girls would rally for me. And so that was my last-ditch effort after my number one ally leaves the game to go to the girls and basically say, "Hey, at least I'm loyal. I know that it's going to be between me and him. Please let it be him."

Well, that sheds some light on why you were targeting Sifu, and also sheds some light that you were aware of that Reba big four alliance. Let's get into the amulets. This was a very odd advantage in that it basically incentivizes you all to vote each other out. You seemed pretty insistent on taking that, but any second thoughts once you got back to the beach in terms of digesting how that could play out?

Absolutely. I was terrified of being caught in my lie at Reba beach when I came back. And we had spent a lot of effort trying to perfect this lie of sweat vs. strategy. And I would say this is one of my proudest moments of the game is we're cycling through potential lies to come back to our camps with, and I throw out sweat vs. strategy and everyone takes it and then we all go to our respective camps and actually everyone believes it.

I go back to Reba and I tell the girls and Sifu that it was sweat vs. strategy we lost. And to my knowledge, they really do believe me. And when Mergatory comes, obviously we see this conversation where folks are discussing the actual true nature of the amulet. And this further goes to my level of distrust in the game that I have so openly lied about this to Dee and Julie. And I do want to go back to what you said and correct it for just half a second. I would say that things are a little bit in the middle. I am aware of the Reba four, but I do also want to give them their flowers and that they played up until this point in the game a great game. So I think I was less aware than I should have been about that developing.

At this point in the game, I'm desperate for people to work with and I think maybe it's blind optimism and just wanting it to work so badly that I think these two people that I'm on the journey with, this would be awesome if this could work out — even though I'm fully aware that it does put a target on each of our backs. I thought maybe that would be an issue a little bit later into the merge. Obviously, it becomes an issue the second that we come back to the beach. So that is definitely a big regret of mine.

And something that I think is especially fun about that journey is that one of the sandwiches is a veggie sandwich and I'm a vegetarian on the beach. I stay vegetarian the whole time. And so I think I saw people discussing the decision making behind taking the amulet and saying "Oh, well, Kellie and J had fish back at camp." In my head I was like, "This sandwich is the thing I can eat. I can't really eat much back at camp, but I can eat this!" So that was a really hard decision for me. I was really, really tempted to take the sandwich.

How difficult is it to get voted out that close to the jury?

I think there was a lot that was difficult to stomach about that Tribal Council. Being close to the jury is one of the things. I think there was a lot that you stay up at night over being like, "How could things have changed if the Shot in the Dark hadn't gone through? What would've happened if I'd stayed in the game longer?" You go through these hypothetical what ifs, but in kind of this poetic way, there is a lot of peace in the way that I go out, because I feel like at the end of the day, what brings us all to Survivor is this love of the game and this love as a viewer to watch the game.

And, of course, I'm playing as a player in that moment, but even in the back of my brain I say, "Wow, what a story this is going to make when I get off the show and I get to watch it back with my friends and family." And to go out with such a bang in such a chaotic Tribal Council that will hopefully go down in the history books, I did feel there was some satisfaction in that leaving.

Immediately when I came home, I was like, "Oh my God!" and parsing it each and every way and going over my gameplay and all the mistakes I made and what I could have done to correct my game. But the more time has passed since that Tribal Council, the more I've been able to take this perspective of, things happen. Everything happens for a reason. In my secret scene from a couple of episodes prior, I talked about control, and it's funny how this theme of control comes up in my gameplay and in the life lessons that I take from this game about how you really can give something your all. You can fight tooth and nail for something and still at the end of the day, things are sometimes out of your control.

If I had to go back and talk about my gameplay from day one, I would say that it is trying desperately to make a bad situation yield a little bit of good, right? Because when the swap happens, I'm immediately like, this is not good for me, but I have at least this new person that I can work with. And for that then to immediately not work out the way that I want it to — even though I'm flipping the votes and I'm really working to save him in the game — the lesson that I took from my experience on Survivor is, it's okay. Sometimes things just don't go your way and you have to put a smile on your face and see the positive in it.

Before I let you go, hit me with a good pun to describe your Shot in the Dark experience.

Oh my God. Okay, I'll give it a shot. First of all, I would say someone was on a roll that night. It was sadly not me, but I did roll with it and things got dicey. But at the end of the day, even though I wanted to, this emerging artist did not make the merge.

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