By now, you have probably heard of the *hilarious* story of how James Reid lasted one month in school because he couldn’t bear other students taking photos of him in class! It happened before he got famous in showbiz, so it really says a lot about his charm and appeal. That said, it is no surprise that his scouting moment also happened shortly after dropping out of school.
In an interview at the Fun With Dumb podcast, he recalls, “I was only doing homeschooling for maybe a month, and then I was just kind of walking down the street, and this guy came out of a gay bar and was like, ‘Hey, you got the look! Here’s my card.’ And then naturally, I just kind of just threw it away and just carried on with my day. I was like, no nah.
“And then the next night, I was at a restaurant, and then the same dude popped up. I was eating with my dad. And then he was like, ‘Hey, you never called me.’ I was like, ‘Oh man, I lost your card.’ And then he was like convincing my dad that I should go to ABS-CBN. That’s the TV network. So I went there hoping to meet people like me.”
He recalls meeting a director, who told him that he was putting him on the famed reality show. “And then, I met a director, he was like, ‘I like this guy. Let’s put him on this show.’ I was like, ‘What’s the show?”, ‘It’s Big Brother.’ So within a couple of days, I was inside the house already. I didn’t have to do an audition.”
In fact, they must’ve really liked James a lot, since the show has already started when they added him to the lineup of housemates! “My audition was a lil’ bit different because the show already started. They were just like, ‘We don’t have Australian. That’s a good flavor. So like, ‘Let’s just throw him, man.’”
Big Brother is an international franchise, so James was already familiar of what the show is about back in Australia. However, according to him, the local version here is so much different. “In the Philippines, if you win the show, they expect you to do big things. In Australia, you win the show, get the money, and then pace yourself back to your normal life.”
He added, “In Australia, I was just a normal dude, and then I came out here to the Philippines; I was in a show!”
Well, you certainly came a long way, James!
