‘Masked Singer’ contestants are treated like deep-cover spies, here’s what it’s really like behind the scenes
'The Masked Singer,' which recently crowned Gretchen Wilson the winner of Season 13, is one of the most popular reality competition shows. With the entire show hinging on the mystery of each contestant’s identity, there is no denying that protecting it isn’t just important; it’s everything. But how does 'The Masked Singer' ensure the level of secrecy is maintained until the end of the show? Despite the challenges, the show seems to have cracked the code, making it to Season 13 and showing no signs of slowing down.
"In another life, I think I maybe should've been a spy or an FBI agent or something because I was extremely excited by the idea of how to keep this all a secret," executive producer Izzie Pick Ibirra said in a candid interview with E! Online. "We had a lot of security measures that were in place from the moment somebody was booked until they were unmasked on the show." Some of those measures? We never, ever, ever refer to anybody by their real name, and that goes for the entire production." Plus, most of the production team had no idea who the show had booked."
She added, "The director didn't know. The writers didn't know. The studio team didn't know," Ibirra revealed. "I was extremely, extremely careful about how many people were privy to that information. People were learning who the cast were as we were taping the show." In another friendly chat with People, Craig Plestis, another executive producer of the show, decoded what it's like for contestants to be on the show. He revealed that contestants wear T-shirts labeled "Don't Talk To Me" and also have visors, hoods, and gloves on.
He added. "You never see any skin because we don't want to give any clues whatsoever. Sometimes contestants will wear multiple sweatshirts to disguise a little bit of their shape for their bodies as well." Plestis further explained, "We keep them (contestants) on different parts of the lot. So if a contestant is practicing on the stage, none of our panelists can ever see them or hear them." He added, "We shut off all the feeds across the lot so no one can even accidentally hear their singing voices ... And all of our contestants are sequestered in a separate part of the lot, with security around them.
It’s not only the contestants and crew; the judges are also under strict rules. Jenny McCarthy described it as "Game of Thrones finale-strict security" in an interview with the outlet. She added, "I feel like that's how The Masked Singer is when you enter the lot. It is so secretive. It is so compartmentalized." McCarthy also revealed that she only learned about the contestants' separate space from reading about it online. "I was reading some news article about how celebrities get their lot, their land of fun. And I'm like, 'Where does this exist?'" she said. "Even though we're all on the same sound stage, we're in two separate worlds."
