Sebastian Noel disses Domenick's 'douchebag' move in Survivor: Ghost Island finale

No one came down harder on any of the Survivor: Ghost Island finalists than the self-proclaimed “lover” Sebastian Noel. Sea Bass was personally hurt by Domenick’s big fake idol pay, even though it was a ruse put into place because Sebastian was planning to vote him out.

What made Sea Bass so upset? And is he still smarting over the treatment? Why did he vote for Wendell? What happened to his early alliance with Chris Noble? And could the man who claimed to “have no strategy” actually have used that as his strategy? We got Sebastian on the phone shortly after the finale to break it all down. (Also make sure to read our interviews with Wendell, Domenick, Laurel, Angela, and Donathan, our finale recap, finale Q&A with Jeff Probst, and interview with Probst and Mark Burnett about NEXT season.)

ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: You played a big role early and late in the finale. First off, let’s just go straight to the vote. You voted for Wendell to win, why?
SEBASTIAN NOEL: They don’t show it at all on TV, but he’s literally my brother from another mother. He was my best friend out there besides Jenna, obviously, and Chris. They don’t show this either, but he was the only one that would go out and spearfish and collect meat and go gather fruit. He was the only other guy that would do that with me, and I was out there every day, so we bonded through that. We’d wake up and go get coals every morning, and we just had this incredible bond. He’s like my brother now, so there’s no way in hell that I’m not voting for Wendell.

That’s interesting as we saw you in the very beginning of this season aligned with Chris Noble early in the game. I was wondering what made you switch over to the Wendell and Dom side of things sort of at the merge. Was it Wendell who got you to switch over?
Yeah, actually at Yanuya we hooked up. And Noble is just ridiculous sometimes, the way he does things. I think he was getting a little homesick. He was kind of driving everyone crazy with his bossiness, so me and Wendell were on the same page as soon as we got back together at Yanuya, and were like, “Dude. This guy’s gotta go.” So me and Wendell kind of decided together that it’s time for buddy boy from the Keys to get his ass back home.

We worked together ever since, but it also kind of seemed pretty easy, for me at least, to kind of hide in a sense. This is not everyone’s favorite strategy, but you can definitely coattail your way behind two big, let’s say moose, Dom and Wendell, and I made it to the final six without hardly any effort, and that’s the way I wanted it to be. You just have to branch out and make that move sooner than I did.

You had that line which made me laugh, and I’m sure made a lot of people laugh, at that final Tribal Council where you say “I had no strategy.” This is a weird question, but I thought to myself, was that actually a strategy of yours, to have no strategy?
Totally. Not gonna lie, not gonna know if I was all in it at that final Tribal Council. Might have had a few adult beverages inside of me. My strategy was pretty simple, it was to be that quiet personable, fisherman type gatherer that just keeps everyone entertained and on their side, because in my opinion, that’s the key to life is just keeping happiness and positivity and everyone laughing. So I thought that if I could do that and somehow pull off a few wins, I’d be doing fine all the way to the end. It turned out to be pretty good in my favor, but as soon as you open your mouth, you end up going home in the game of Survivor, and that’s what happened to me, unfortunately.

How confused were you by that move by Angela to squeal on your plan there to take Domenick out?
I don’t know if Angela was all in it either. The lack of food seriously gets to your head, and you can start seeing it in Angela pretty seriously. No offense to her, but she was deteriorating out there. Me and Angela were pretty close the whole way through the game. She’d braid my hair and everything, so I thought that if I could just drop this one little bomb in her head that we could make it all the way to the final 3 if we just pull this sly move off while we still can and while still have a few numbers and a few tricks up our sleeves. All you have to do is keep your mouth shut. That’s all you have to do.

For some reason, she saw it in her brain that she could make it further in the game with Dom and Wendell, so she spilled the beans. Actually, Donathan spilled the beans on me as well, but it was Angela who definitely ruined it for me. It’s just unfortunate that we couldn’t all get on the same page. Sitting there at Tribal, you could see it in my face. I was so depressed when I heard that somebody let the cat out of the bag.

Let’s talk about that final Tribal. You took Domenick to task for making a big stink at that first one and sort of twisting the knife with his big display, but you also at the same time admitted, “Hey, it worked.” It got you off your plan to take him out. So tell me how that whole display by Dom sits with you now.
Well, I love Dom as a human and I always will, but he was literally bullying the hell out of Donathan. He was calling him names. At one point, he took his idol out of the bag, both his fake idol and his real idol, and asked Donathan in the most obnoxious way, “Which one should I play, eh?” Just completely a douchebag, and he would not stop, and Donathan was being polite to him. You don’t have to do that, even though if it’s all an act for the million dollars, which almost worked for him. It just pushed me off on the wrong end of the stick for him. For two or three days, actually probably a month, I couldn’t stand even the thought of Dom.

Wow, really. So it was that strong?
Yeah, every night when I went to sleep, it was Dom’s Clooney face in my thoughts, just bossin’ people around, so he kind of haunted me in a ghostly fashion.

How did you guys then come back together?
He’s such a sweet guy, he’s such a family man. He called me about two months later, and we talked for about an hour, and then we never got together, but we Facebooked and Snapchatted all the way through the finale. He’s a good guy; he just knows how to play Survivor. I think we should have an open call in New York, because if Jeff can get a bunch Doms on that show, I think the ratings would go up a lot.

You didn’t even bother using your extra vote. Why not?
Yeah, at one point in that Tribal, as soon as I heard that the cat was out of the bag and I admitted I had the vote and Dom played his fake idol, I was like, “Okay, well, in my opinion, we were still voting for Donathan because that’s what I had spoken to Dom about and Wendell. So if I vote with them, then I’m still on their good side and I can still hopefully be a part of the majority and probably knock Laurel or Angela out.” Which is what we had talked about, and they don’t show that on TV, but we had talked about taking the big 3 to the final 3 because I think they could have beat me, or they probably thought they could have beat me, but you never know when you get to the final 3. It just didn’t work out in my favor.

The jury’s all living and talking together at Ponderosa. Did you have a feeling that the vote was going to be that close? Was it discussed before you guys went to Tribal?
Yeah, totally. I kind of tried to convince a couple people that weren’t voting with me, because no offense to Laurel, I didn’t think anybody was gonna vote for her, but yeah, you could kind of sense that it was going to be a close vote. You could definitely tell that it probably was gonna come down to the last vote, and it did. When Jeff walked out there like he was gonna announce the winner of Survivor season 1 to Richard Hatch during Tribal Council we were all like, “What the heck? This is crazy!” So I think everyone was a little or “a lottle” shocked.

Also make sure to check out our interviews with Wendell, Domenick, Laurel, Angela, and Donathan, in addition to our full recap, Jeff Probst finale Q&A, Jeff Probst & Mark Burnett franchise deep dive as well as the duo previewing the NEXT season of Survivor: David vs. Goliath. And for all the Survivor scoop, follow Dalton on Twitter @DaltonRoss.