In the Spotlight

On Sunday, the new series of "Survivor" started on Channel One, and mud-spattered, moaning celebrities will be dominating the channel for the next few months. Hopefully the 3 million ruble ($109,000) prize will still be worth something by the end.

The first episode showed the 21 contestants herded into a jungle enclosure in Panama and forced to give up all the luxuries in their suitcases, from lighters to soap, although a diarrhea medicine ?€” one of the show's sponsors ?€” was given the green light. Then they were taken in helicopters to a rusty cargo ship. That was where the show really began, as the contestants had to jump into the water with their luggage and swim to an island. The last one to reach the island was to be kicked off the show immediately.

To add insult to injury, the host Ksenia Sobchak chose this tense moment to throw open a chest on board the ship and force each contestant to drink a glass of J7 juice, which also sponsors the show.

It was at this point that two contestants, writer Viktor Yerofeyev and actor and singer Nikita Dzhigurda threw in the towel and refused to go on. I could not blame them, as the sea looked choppy and extremely uninviting, and the island seemed unreasonably far away. However, both contestants gave interviews after the show saying their refusal was a principled one based on sadistic treatment by the show's makers and the unfairness of making men compete with young girls.

Naturally, none of this was reflected in Channel One's coverage. The makers must have been annoyed at two of the most charismatic contestants leaving the show, and they took it out on them in the edit. Yerofeyev was shown chain-smoking, complaining of the cold and petulantly slamming down the lid of his suitcase when a Channel One minion tried to search it. The camera also zoomed in on his paunch. Meanwhile, Dzhigurda was crucified in comments by the other contestants. "He has a small, pathetic soul," said Evelina Blyodans, an actress who plays a madam in NTV's shameless drama series "Damned Heaven."

This week's Sem Dnei magazine also stuck in the knife in an article listing how Dzhigurda hogged all the water in an outside shower and how he and Yerofeyev swore at a Channel One psychologist who was trying to empathize with them after the show.

So far, it's hard to pick a standout contestant who will carry the show. It is rather short of stars. One of the best seems to be Kornelia Mango, a mixed-race singer who appeared on the "Star Factory" talent show. She stuck up for her team, which is almost all girls, after they came last in a canoe race. It's hard to be too excited about celebrities such as Yulia Kovalchuk, a former member of Blestyashchiye girl group or Tatyana Gerasimova, who is the eye-candy on "Armeisky Magazin," a television show made for the armed forces.

Maybe the ordinary people will come out as the real stars. They include a hotel manager, a kindergarten teacher and a long-distance truck driver. However, I already do not like the look of the youngest contestant, 19-year-old Yaroslav, who is described as an "ecologist and student." Perhaps Channel One has a nonstandard definition of ecologist, because in this case it meant that he stopped on the path, picked up a large cricket and, while it was still alive, pulled off one of its legs and tried to eat it. I certainly wouldn't want to be stuck with him on long, dark nights in the middle of the Panamanian jungle.