Devin Way on being himself, the importance of community, and why Survivor is 'gay sports'

Devin Way discovered Survivor at a watch party at Los Feliz bar Hi Tops. A friend invited him out, and he quickly saw just how passionate fans of the long-running CBS reality series could be.

"Oh, Survivor is gay sports," Way tells Out. "It's the closest I've ever felt to how I imagine straight people feel at a sports bar, watching a football game or soccer or something. I was like, wow, the community, the camp, the camping. Let's go."

Now he’s on the other side of the screen as a castaway on Survivor season 51. The actor, best known for playing Brodie on the Queer as Folk reboot, has a theory about why the show resonates so deeply with queer audiences. “Being queer myself, the magic that I found in Survivor is the removal of masks,” he says. “It's taking everything away and playing an elimination game. What do queer people love? RuPaul. It is an elimination game. We love to see people fight for their life and win, the hope of winning, because that was so much of our stories.”

“We were born into a world that told us we were different. We were broken. We were not okay. We put on a mask, and then as we started to learn ourselves, those masks started to strip away, and we were in a survival game,” he adds.

Part of the appeal is the freedom to be more than one thing. “Being strategic, being cunning. Not just being the bright, positive, happy-go-lucky, but maybe the strategic, playful, sinister sides of ourselves too. I think that really resonates with queer people. It resonated with me.”

Linnea Capobianco, Devin Way, and Ori Jean-Charles on 'Survivor 51.'Robert Voets/CBS

For Way, this opportunity allows him to share who he is in a way press tours for his acting work didn’t. Interviews around Queer as Folk understandably focused on his journey to queerness, while conversations about his role as Jordan on Sistas often centered on playing a straight man or being biracial. Survivor doesn’t come with a character to filter the questions through.

“It is just who is Devin in totality. When all the distractions, all of my comforts are stripped away, and it’s just me on an island with strangers. Who am I? What comes up? That’s something you’re gonna have to stay tuned to find out,” he teases.

One part of Way’s identity? Not being able to swim. “I'm actually negatively buoyant, which means if I get in water, I just immediately sink. And of course, I did my little swim training before I went out there. No improvement. The world's worst swimmer on the planet,” he admits. That made one of the first moments of the game, when the castaways had to jump off a boat, particularly difficult for Way, as viewers can see in the season preview.

Looking around the boat before jumping into the water, Way realized what being on the show would mean to people. “I didn’t expect, when I showed up on a beach of 21 individuals, that I would be, as far as I understand, the only out gay male there,” he says. “When you look around and you don’t see anyone who’s like you, then you are the thing that is representing.”

'Survivor 51' contestant Devin Way.Robert Voets/CBS

After his stint on Queer as Folk, Way understands the impact his work can have on queer audiences, and he takes that responsibility seriously. "I just hope that when people tune in, whether they like me or hate me, that they're entertained, and that my presence, even for the one second that I'm in the trailer or whatever the thing is, means something."

As the creator of The Dev Games, it’s clear his passion for play and community extends far beyond an island in Fiji. The event is an organized day of games where people come together for activities like tug-of-war. What started as 40 friends playing in a park has grown to more than 220 participants and raised $33,000 for American Indian Services. Way is planning a winter edition this year and hopes to find a new organization to partner with, as well as incorporate an Angel Tree to provide holiday gifts for local families.

"One of my favorite quotes is, you learn more about a person in an hour of play than you do in a year of talking," he says. "That was kind of how Dev Games was born."

So while his fall will be consumed with his adventures on Survivor, Way is continuing to build the kind of community that first drew him to the show in the first place.

Survivor 51 premieres September 23 on CBS.

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