The ousted player also reveals the unaired conversation that may have turned Dee against him.

Survivor 50’s Charlie Davis reacts to be called the ‘dumbest player here’ by Dee

The ousted player also reveals the unaired conversation that may have turned Dee against him.

By Dalton Ross

Dalton Ross is a writer and editor with over 25 years experience covering TV and the entertainment industry. *Survivor* is kind of his thing.

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March 26, 2026 1:23 p.m. ET

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Charlie Davis on 'Survivor 50'. Credit:

Robert Voets/CBS

Charlie Davis was haunted by the ghosts of *Survivor* juries past when he entered *Survivor 50*. And that haunting may have contributed to his first ever torch snuffing when he was voted out of the Cila tribe on this week's episode.

Charlie was "pissed off" when he heard tribemate Rizo Velovic say he didn't vote for his No. 1 from *Survivor 49*, Sophi Balerdi, to win his first season. Not knowing that Rizo was actually lying about how close he was with Savannah Louie, Charlie became determined to get him out of the game, citing his own personal history of being denied a million-dollar prize from a former island BFF when Maria Shrime-Gonzalez instead voted for Kenzie Petty to win *Survivor 46*.

Rizo picked up that Charlie didn't want to work with him, and once Dee Valladares also decided to turn on her original Kalo tribemates Charlie and Jonathan Young and from a women's alliance with Rizo, the fate of Taylor Swift's biggest fan was sealed. And there was insult added to injury, with Dee proclaiming that "I actually thought Charlie was the most dangerous player here, but I actually think he's the dumbest player here." (Ouch.)

How does the blindside victim feel about how everything transpired? Does he blame himself for focusing too much on his past Maria pain? Was he surprised by Dee's harsh assessment? And what happened after the cameras turned off? We asked Charlie all that and more, and you can watch or read the entire interview below.

**: You seemed legitimately shocked by the vote. Tell me what was going through your mind as you got your torch snuffed.**

**CHARLIE DAVIS:** I guess to take you back into the moment where the votes are being read, basically, as soon as Rizo didn't play his Shot in the Dark, I think I said in the moment, "Oh, I'm cooked." Like, I knew immediately something was up because earlier in the day, Devens had talked about how Rizo had pitched me to Devens. So I knew Rizo was coming after me. So that was not a surprise, I guess, but I did not expect or think at all that Dee and Kamilla had flipped. That was the main piece there, which really surprised me. And I think in the moment I even, went to Dee and was like, "This was you?" I said something to that effect.

So that was definitely what was going through my head in that moment, like, "Oh, Dee and Kamilla flipped on me." I was kind of looking around at everyone, like, "Was it you? Was it you? Who did this?" But as soon as Rizo didn't play a Shot in the Dark, I was like, "Oh, no. This is not good."

**We saw you with your head buried in your hands during your final words. How did you cope with this all once the cameras turned off?**

It's really weird. It was a weird experience. I remember walking down… It's a very dark sort of lonely pathway out of Tribal Council. It's very quiet and there's nothing, no people around. You just kind of walk, and then they take you into a tent and then they funnel you to do the final words. And it was a lot of emotions.

I mean, you're kind of trying to process what exactly went wrong, what happened. But I had a moment that day with the production team where I remember it so specifically: There was someone in the confessional production staff making these micro adjustments on the shade of the confessional to get it just so. And I was like, "Man, they really, really care here." So it was a nice moment to have, because there's a ton of production [people] who are there at Tribal and you get to really thank them and take some time to let them know, "Thanks for making us look good," and stuff.

Charlie Davis on 'Survivor 50'.

**Look, we talked about it before the game. You were very honest and told me you might not ever fully get over the Maria vote, and that certainly seemed to play into your game here. Do you think those season 46 scars impacted your game on *Survivor 50*?**

I think definitely to a degree. Obviously, I'm not gonna say like, "Oh, that wasn't true." I think it was slightly incomplete. I had strategic reasons for targeting Rizo as well. I think also more what did me in was my complacency with Dee and Kamilla.

I thought on that swapped tribe, I had a little bit more room to play off a bit of emotion and less dialed-in strategy. Not to say that I wasn't strategizing and all of that, but I think that's really the combination of I was like, "Okay, I got this feeling that I wanna act on." And I thought also I had the wiggle room to do that here because I thought I was coming in with good numbers [from original Kalo].

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**Did it make it harder to have this all go down once you got out of the game and realized that Rizo *didn't* really betray his number one and was just trying to distance himself from Savannah in the game so they didn't seem so close?**

Honestly, I just thought it was really comical. I thought it was funny. Obviously based off what people have seen, they're like, "Oh, man, you must hate this Rizo's guy's guts." But I was like, "No, I don't. I don't hate Rizo." I mean, maybe out there I kinda had some island beef with him, but even on the island we shared some fun moments and good moments of connection. And I definitely talked about that in confessional too, the conflict of those two things.

So no, I don't have hatred towards Rizo. But it was definitely funny watching. And honestly, before then, at Ponderosa, I talked to Savannah about it. I kinda joked around with her and she was like, "Oh, I was definitely his number one!" I was like, "Oh, well."

**Let's talk about some of the assessments of your game your fellow tribemates were making. Let’s start with Dee.**

Why are we starting with Dee? [*Laughs*]

**She calls you "the dumbest player here." What was it like hearing that?**

I mean, not, not great. It wasn't super-fun to hear. What I'll say is I think Dee and I were playing very different games, and I hoped and thought all along that I was working with Dee and thought that I would continue to work with Dee. I considered her a really tight ally out there. And probably a little bit of a blind spot, because I knew her outside the game before the game. So I just didn't really have it in my mind to target her at all. But I think when we were actually out there, we just didn't sync up that much.

We did talk strategy. On Kalo, the five-person alliance I was in was, me, Tiffany, Dee, Kamilla, and Mike. And those three women were very evidently working together. Chrissy, Coach, Jonathan — with a lot of that coming from Chrissy — would be like, "Those three women, they're a big threat. We gotta get one of them out. They're such an obvious trio." And that was true. They were being really obvious and out front about it. It was not hidden.

But I was sort of brought in with them and considered them my alliance, as a fourth. And then I wanted to sort of bring in Mike to that as the majority five, hypothetically. But we were also tight with the other side, so we were kind of in a good spot there. So that was kind of the Kalo dynamics. And I think you kind of have to know that to understand the relationship with Dee. That's why I thought we were fine. I thought we had an alliance, and I think some of my gameplay was putting her off a little bit.

Charlie Davis and Mike White on 'Survivor 50'.

**Putting off how, though? That's what I don't understand.**

I mean, I don't know. Maybe there's one conversation that sticks out to me where it was one of our first strategic conversations after a day or so on the beach, and basically everyone on the beach had come to me and was like, "Dee is playing really hard"— everyone from Tiffany to Chrissy, even people who were in Dee's alliance. And I had a conversation with her. I was like, "A lot of people are telling me you're playing hard." And she was almost incredulous when I told her that. She was taken aback. I think she thought maybe I was trying to mess with her, looking back, and it just pinged something on her.

I can't speak for her, but I think she was just sort of wary of me past that point. I mean, from my perspective, I was genuinely trying to help, but she really didn't like… It wasn't a great conversation.

**Kamilla had that comment I didn't quite understand where she said you were playing too slow, but she also said you were working too many angles, which seems a bit like an oxymoron, but maybe what she meant by that is what you're saying is that you were kind of floating around too much? What did you make of that?**

Yeah, maybe floating around too much. I think that's sort of what I was getting at where we were playing very different games on Kalo. They were just hard out at the gun, very obvious, like, "It's gonna be us versus them. Lock it down. Pick a side." And I sort of more had the attitude of, "Why do we need to be making so many enemies, especially on a season where there are all these different connections?"

It’s not just solo players we're dealing with. If you get on one person's nerves, when they connect with the people they know or have pregamed with or whatever it may be, they're gonna be like, "Okay, it's time to get that person out." So I was more of the mind of, "Try to stay good with as many people as you can until you don't have to do that."

And that was my rationale for targeting Rizo strategically as well, because I thought he would have the least connections. And I thought that basically the narrative to get Rizo out is that he's an unknown. And the more people get to know him, the less that's a narrative anymore. So that was just kinda how I was treating things. And I think I would've actually been in a great spot going into merge. So I think Kamilla and Dee just had a different idea of things and didn't maybe like how I was setting myself up.

Charlie Davis on 'Survivor 50'.

Robert Voets/CBS

**What else happened out there that didn't make it to TV that you wish we had seen?**

There were tons of fun moments on original Kalo tribe, and interesting strategy too. I had good alliances with Tiffany, Mike, Coach, Dee, I thought, so that didn't really make air. There were just so many funny moments too. One of them sticks out to me is Mike gave this really, really speech about colonics, which I don't even wanna get into it. I can't do it any justice, but it was so funny. There was just a lot of good times had over there. I wish some of those had made it.

Like, when Coach injured his calves doing the snorkeling with Jonathan, he was debilitated for days. And we were actively rehabbing him. And he was kind of down in the dumps about the Ozzy and Q stuff. So there were a lot of good moments with Coach. We were trying to keep his head and body in the game and stuff like that I wish had made it.

**We've talked about those season 46 scars. What kind of scars do you now carry from *this* experience?**

No scars, no scars. I feel fine. I’m mainly just disappointed to go out early. It's tough, but I don't really hold any sort of scars against anyone. It's tough when your original tribe just turns on you like that. or at least a portion of it. So that was tough and it was not super-fun to have Dee be like "the dumbest player out here." But honestly, I'm grateful to be part of the season. And I don't hold any grudges or anything.

Charlie Davis on 'Survivor 50'.

Robert Voets/CBS

**Did they throw that challenge to get you out?**

So I actually don't know. And it's funny that wasn't really shown, but I had a conversation with Jonathan where he sort of alluded to the fact that maybe *we* should throw the challenge to get Rizo out. That was the morning of the challenge when Rick had just been like, "Oh, Rizo's targeting Charlie." So we had a conversation, but as far as I know, neither of us actually… Like, we were trying pretty hard on that challenge. But I did hear later on that potentially they tried to and they maybe thought about throwing it to get me out. So I don't know. You'll have to ask them.

**I saved the most important question for last: Have you locked down your season 4 *White Lotus* cameo yet?**

Oh my gosh. I mean, I should be so lucky. That would be cool to go to the south of France, but no, I got nothing to report there.

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