Survivor 50

The calls before Survivor 50: what Jerri Manthey said about Colby Donaldson

Colby Donaldson was cast in Survivor 50: In the Hands of the Fans. Jerri Manthey was not. Manthey later said Donaldson phoned her multiple times before that season, trying to convince her she needed him to get through it, and that she found the approach "infuriating and condescending". Donaldson has not publicly responded.

Confirmed What is established is that Manthey made these statements, and that Donaldson was cast in Survivor 50 while she was not. Her reading of why he called is her characterisation, kept in quotation marks and attributed to her. No response from Donaldson has been located.

Jerri Manthey Jerri Manthey Colby Donaldson Colby Donaldson

What the record shows

  • Confirmed In an interview with TheThings, reported by Surviving Tribal, Jerri Manthey said Colby Donaldson called her multiple times before Survivor 50, "trying to convince me that I needed him" to get through the season. She said she found that funny.
  • Confirmed Donaldson was cast in Survivor 50: In the Hands of the Fans. Manthey is not in the cast, and the report describes her as cut from it.
  • Confirmed Manthey said the outreach was "infuriating and condescending", and said of Donaldson that "he has not changed a single bit, whereas I have evolved". Those are her characterisations of him, quoted and attributed. They are not findings about him.
  • Unverified No response from Donaldson has been located. Nothing reviewed here records him addressing her account, and nothing establishes that he was asked to.
  • Unverified No published Survivor rule barring one prospective returning player from phoning another before a cast is set has been located, and no CBS statement, penalty or comment about these calls has been found. Nothing here says a rule was broken.
  • Unverified The account is second-hand: Surviving Tribal reporting an interview TheThings conducted. That report carries no publication date, and the original TheThings interview page was not opened for this record.
  • Confirmed The two played Survivor: The Australian Outback, Survivor: All-Stars and Survivor: Heroes vs. Villains together. Survivor 50 is the first season either of them returned to without the other.

What Manthey said about the phone calls

Ahead of Survivor 50: In the Hands of the Fans, Jerri Manthey told TheThings that Colby Donaldson called her multiple times. On her account he was "trying to convince me that I needed him" to get through the season, which she said struck her as funny. She said she read the calls as an attempt to advance his own game, and said that was fine by her.

The framing is the part she objected to. She said the outreach was "infuriating and condescending", and she said of Donaldson that "he has not changed a single bit, whereas I have evolved". Those sentences are one player's assessment of another she has known since they filmed in Australia. They stay in quotation marks on this page because that is all they are. Nobody has adjudicated them and nothing here treats them as established.

He was cast. She was not.

Donaldson is in the Survivor 50 cast. Manthey is not, and the report describes her as cut from it. That asymmetry is what gives the story its shape. The calls, on her telling, came while the season was still being assembled, and only one of the two people on them ended up on the beach.

It is also a first. Donaldson has played four seasons: The Australian Outback, All-Stars, Heroes vs. Villains and Survivor 50. Manthey has played the first three of those. Every previous time either of them came back, the other came back too. Survivor 50 broke that pattern, which is worth holding in mind when reading how she describes the calls.

This is not the Survivor 49 pre-gaming story

Search suggestions attach the word pregaming to this, and the word is doing work the facts do not support. The rule Survivor enforces covers the pre-game hold. Once cast members reach the location they are kept apart and told not to speak to one another, and two Survivor 49 players were removed roughly twelve hours before filming for repeatedly breaking it.

What Manthey described is different in every respect. It was a phone call, to someone who was not cast, about a season neither of them had started. No published rule against that has been located. There is no CBS statement, no penalty and no announced review. Nothing on this page says Donaldson broke anything, and it should not be read that way.

Softened, then flared again

The standard summary of these two is that they feuded on The Australian Outback and mellowed afterwards. The first half holds. The second half is out of date. Whatever eased between All-Stars and Heroes vs. Villains, the Survivor 50 comments are not the comments of someone who considers the matter closed.

So the honest answer to whether they are friends now is that in her most recent public remarks she was openly irritated with him, and he has said nothing in reply that could be found. A rivalry that softened and then flared again describes the record better than one that mellowed.

What this page does not have

Donaldson's side. No response from him has been located, and that gap should stay a gap. He may describe the calls differently, he may not think they are worth describing, and nobody has shown he was even asked. Nothing here should be read as him declining to comment.

The sourcing has a limit worth naming too. The account comes from Surviving Tribal's report of a TheThings interview, so it is second-hand, and that report carries no publication date. The quotations are hers as the report gives them. The casting facts are separately checkable against the Survivor 50 cast list, which is why they are stated plainly and her account is not.

People in this story

Questions people ask

Are Jerri Manthey and Colby Donaldson friends now?
Not on her most recent public remarks. Ahead of Survivor 50 she said Donaldson's repeated calls were "infuriating and condescending" and that "he has not changed a single bit, whereas I have evolved". No reply from him has been located.
What did Jerri Manthey say about Colby Donaldson calling her?
She said he called multiple times before Survivor 50, "trying to convince me that I needed him" to get through the season. She said she found that funny, and that she read it as him trying to advance his own game.
Was Jerri Manthey on Survivor 50?
No. Donaldson was cast in Survivor 50: In the Hands of the Fans and she was not. It is the first season either of them returned to without the other.
Did Colby Donaldson break a rule by calling her?
No source shows that. Survivor's no-talking rule covers the pre-game hold, after players are cast and in isolation at the location. This was a phone call to someone who was not cast. There has been no CBS statement, penalty or review.
Has Colby Donaldson responded?
Nothing has been located. No statement from him about her account was found, and nothing establishes that he was asked for one, so his silence should not be read as agreement or as a refusal to comment.
How many seasons did Jerri Manthey and Colby Donaldson play together?
Three: Survivor: The Australian Outback, Survivor: All-Stars and Survivor: Heroes vs. Villains. Donaldson added a fourth appearance in Survivor 50 without her.

Sources

Checked on 2026-07-26. If something here is wrong or out of date, we want to know: get in touch.