‘Deal or No Deal Island’: La Shell Wooten Spills on Hating ‘The Family’ & Making a Bad Deal

All throughout the second season of Deal or No Deal Island, La Shell Wooten managed to remain friendly with everyone in the cast and become a target of no one… until it came down to herself and Dickson Wong, with Parvati Shallow having to choose which one of them would face the banker. Though Parvati made a promise to protect La Shell, Dickson was her “son” in their Family Alliance, so that relationship prevailed.

In the temple, she batted away several offers — including one for $725,000 — but found herself in a tricky situation with only three numbers left on the board ($.01, $1.75 million, and $2.5 million) and an offer of $1.558 million. It was a substantial gesture from the banker, but it had only a 33 percent chance of working out in her favor, and ultimately, it did not. After she took the deal, her case turned out to be worth $1.75 million.

Her subsequent exit was very graceful, and she was glad to have left the team with a nice chunk of change added to the pot. But was La Shell surprised by Parvati’s decision, and why did she take the deal? TV Insider caught up with La Shell Wooten to find out!

As a social worker, how did that background help your social game? 

La Shell Wooten: Tremendously. Being a social worker helped me tremendously because I study people and human behavior, and part of the skill you have to have as a social worker, you have to see what people are not saying, right, in order to be helpful to them. In this case, in order to figure out how to maneuver around or manipulate players in the game, I had to figure out what they weren’t saying and be quite perceptive, and I have a lot of experience doing that, so it helped a lot.

The career also involves knowing a thing or two about dysfunction. What were some of the moments that kind of shocked you throughout the season? 

I can honestly say not much shocked me at all, but it was quite a bit of fun to watch the dysfunction and actually finally be in a position where I don’t have to do anything to fix it, right? I just had to navigate my way away from it and then lean into it when it was to my benefit, but it wasn’t shocking to me at all. The interesting thing is I have never seen Survivor, I’ve never seen Big Brother. So there’s a lot of information I think people came into the show with that was playing with them. I didn’t have any of that, so for me, I was just kind of along for the ride and having fun and learning as I go, as opposed to worrying about what I know to be true about these types of games before, so it helped.

A lot of fans have compared your kind of low-key demeanor in the games to Jordan Fowler, who won in Season 1. You said you didn’t watch Survivor, but did you watch Season 1? 

I didn’t watch it in its entirety, and I can see what they mean.  I feel like I was a little bit more active — or at least that’s what it looked like in the editing, right? I feel like in Season 1, I didn’t even realize who Jordan was until like the last two episodes. I feel like people knew who I was from the beginning, regardless of the editing. So I get the comparison because it felt like I was playing the middle, but I was actually always in the middle. I was just sort of the calming presence in the middle that people welcomed instead of looked out for, sort of in a strategy kind of way.

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One person who did tell me he looked out for you was David Genat. He said you were his number one after Maria-Grace left. But he still encouraged you to put yourself at risk in the daily. How do you feel about the fact that he was protecting Parvati over you? 

Well, honestly, that’s not actually the way that I saw it. Me and David definitely had a real bond. We lived together — him, me, and MG —  but when it was time to decide at the top of that last challenge, there was no way I was going over that gorge, regardless, right? I also felt like he would do what he could to protect me. Again, Parvati is a slippery slope, right? No matter how close you think you are with her. And I used to tell him that like, “Don’t get played, and no matter how close you think you are with her, she’s still gonna make decisions that shock you.” So I hoped that CK’s alliance with Parvati, and she had my back, and David’s alliance with Parvati would keep me safe, but it didn’t. She only had two people to pick. If there was a third person, I think she would have left me out of it.

Monty Brinton / NBC

Were you surprised that Dickson didn’t want to go back in after how well he did the first time? 

I was. Dickson is someone whose energy can be easily rattled, and I think that he was very, very happy about the first time he played. I mean, he did amazing, and I really think he felt like he could not have the same kind of luck a second time. And Dickson is a hardcore reality TV fan, and so he did not want to see himself eliminated at all, and so I think his nerves got the best of him, which isn’t surprising. He was nervous all the time.

With Parvati, you said you thought she was slippery. Were you surprised at the time at all that she made the decision she did? 

No, not at all. No, I was hoping against all hope that she wouldn’t, but I also knew if she picked Dickson, what does that say to everyone else who’s still there, right? Because she’s his “mom,” and she really played that to the hilt. And so if you could put your “son” up, then how can I trust the alliance I have with you? So I feel like she was in a difficult position. I don’t think it was hard for her to make the decision, but you’re here to play, and she did.

You brought up the “Family.” Just as a social worker, what do you think of that whole dynamic? 

I hated the “Family.” I was like, “This is so ridiculous.” The thing that I didn’t like the most about the family was Dickson, right? I kept telling Dickson, “You are a grown man… You’re here playing with us. You’re a grown man. You don’t need to keep like ponying up to David and Parvati about being your mom and dad, and I think he saw it as a strategy, and it was, but at the same time, I’m like, “But look at how everyone else is seeing you. It’s making you a target and if they have to protect you over themselves, you’re out of here.” So I kept trying to tell him that because it was really getting under my skin. But, you know, he decided to ride it out.

Yeah, it got a little emotional, too, on last night’s episode. Do you think that was real? 

I do, I do. Dickson and I really had some great conversations, and he really has some family dynamics that when he thinks about them, they weigh heavy on him. David’s a really great guy, and so he was very genuine with me for sure, and he was genuine with Dickson, and I really do believe that Dickson felt the experience that he was longing for in a dad himself. And David came to me in the dome after that exchange and actually cried some more about it because he was missing his own kids, right? And then he had Dickson here kind of reminding him of his fatherhood, and he also lost his father, and so did I, right? David and I both lost our dads, so we understood. And we had great dads. So that was very real, and I’m glad they actually showed a bit of that.

You went to the temple and you made a choice when you got the offer of over a million. Did you know at the time that the odds weren’t in your favor? 

Yes, so I’m a people person, not a numbers person, but I did understand. You don’t see this in the edit, but CK was advising me to go again… My concern was there was a large number up there and a low one, and if I picked the low one, the money would drop significantly. I couldn’t change what I picked, so I was like, I’d rather make the choice to one, go out on my own if I had to go, and two, leave a lot of money in the pot. My legacy in my life is giving — not to my own detriment, but at the same time, I accidentally ended up on the show. I was winning no matter what. Just being there was a win, being there longer than people like Storm, who was basically an action figure, and Dr. Will, who’s reality royalty. I really was like, I had a good game no matter what happens. So I kind of understood the odds and I did hear what CK was trying to tell me to do because she is a banker, but at the same time, I didn’t want to be like, “I’m out and I left, you know, a dollar like Luke did.” I just didn’t want to do that to myself.

Monty Brinton / NBC

You predicted the game was going to become vicious after you left. What made you think that? 

Well, we were getting down to the people who were really alliance-heavy, and everyone at that point was showing that their alliances weren’t really real. And the people who depended on them, like CK and Phillip, who actually were very in and had a lot of integrity around the alliances they formed, they were pissed. They were over it. And then the other people who were left like Lete and David and Parvati, no one knew… It was really a crapshoot to know if they were really being serious or playing games with people, and I just felt like with me gone because I was sort of the emotional equalizer in the camp, it was now all knives out.

When you left, who were you rooting for to win and who did you think had the best chance to win? 

Honestly, when I left, I felt like anybody there really had a good chance to win. I think my top choice of who I would have wanted to win out of who was left would have been CK or Philip. They worked so hard.

Deal or No Deal Island, Tuesdays, 9/8c, NBC