Bertram van Munster

The idea for The Amazing Race is kind of legend at this point.

The creator of the show, Elise Doganieri, told her husband, like, "Why aren't there any good TV shows?" And her husband, uh, Bertram van Munster, basically was like, "Well, if you have one, why don't you, why don't you write it down, figure it out?" [chuckles] And she did, and came up with this concept.

But that was just the very beginning of it.

It, of course, wasn't a fully formed TV show then because that's not how television works, and it's especially not how reality TV works.

And he told me, and here's a quote, "I had been pitched probably three or four times a race around the world." Imagine that.

Three or four people, production companies, producers, whoever, had already thought of this idea, you know, and said like, "Let's, let's do this." But as Ken told me, and I'll continue the quote here, "Every time I would say, 'So where have you shot any shows?' In most cases, they never shot anywhere outside the United States.

Having developed Survivor, I knew very well that it's not as easy as everyone says." Bert, uh, Bertram, that's Bertram van Munster, had shot everywhere around the world, and he had a very specific point of view about the, how the craziness of travel and traveling under pressure, and the fascination with different spots around the world that weren't on every tourist map, or the comedy of it, could make for interesting television.

So it's not so much, you know, it's like the idea that Elise came up with combined with, uh, Bert's experience, knowledge, and, uh, work already that showed that he understood not just the logistics of doing this, but the actual, um, storytelling that could take place that allowed it to be green-lit by CBS.