'Amazing Race' contestant speaks of experiences
By SARAH KENNEDY -- Calgary Sun
Jonathan Baker's pulse is racing.
The villainous Amazing Race contestant who, along with his wife Victoria Fuller, was kicked off the race on the Jan. 18 episode, says he has had a hard time watching the show (which wraps up Tuesday at 9 p.m. in a two-hour finale on DE) because of how he was portrayed.
"I'm not happy with what I see up there. I'm a better person than that. That doesn't represent me or our relationship," Baker says. "I call it reality blurred."
Baker says he was so angry, he's called CBS several times to complain.
"I asked, 'what is wrong with you people?' We gave them the good, the bad and the ugly and all they showed was the ugly."
The argumentative couple had tongues really wagging one episode when, during a race to a pit stop, Baker become so angry with Fuller, he shoved her.
"I was upset because we had a three-day lead over everybody and she ruined it," he says during a phone interview with the Sun.
"I ruined it?" Fuller yells in the background, launching an argument.
"I threw my bag. I didn't know she picked it up and she cried in hysterics because she knew she made a mistake and that I was going to be pissed," says Baker recalling the episode. "Unfortunately, I made a conscious decision to show my raw emotions. I shouldn't have done it, but I didn't know how it was going to look."
Following the incident, host Phil Keoghan somewhat chastised Baker, ordering him to go talk to his wife.
"Phil handled it horribly," says Baker. "He thought he had to teach me something and I thought what is going on? Is this a race or what? He had me on the race mat for 15 minutes before telling me to go talk to her."
After that episode, Baker says he decided he was done with the race, but he claims executive producer Bertram van Munster convinced him to stay.
"He said, 'you are one of greatest reality characters of all reality shows of all time.' It gave me enough justification to go forward."
However, van Munster has been quoted saying Baker and Fuller may have actually scared away viewers.
Things did not seem to improve between the contentious couple after the notorious shoving incident.
Screaming matches intensified and one clip showed Baker bonk Fuller on the head in the back of a taxi.
"But they didn't show me apologize afterwards," he says of CBS. "I blame them for not having a better storyline. Who wants to see spousal abuse?"
Fellow-contestant and wrestler Bolo Dar'tainian also commented in a recent interview that Baker's treatment of Fuller was "way out of line."
When hearing this, Baker laughs.
"I think he's a little two-faced. He and Lori punched each other all the time. In Corsica, he almost slapped her."
The seemingly abusive relationship also had consequences for the couple back in the real world.
Fuller explains: "For my family it made it look like more was going on behind closed doors. Any good parent is going to have questions. They talked about it with Jonathan and everything is good now, but at the time they had a lot of lingering questions for him."
Baker says their abrasive personalities was part of a shtick. "We walked in there like a speeding train hitting a wall. We wanted to be the villains, we wanted to cause trouble."
However, Baker says his more benevolent and strategic acts went unnoticed.
In Ethiopia, he and Fuller gave $1,000 US and all of their clothes to children.
Although Baker and Fuller can't comment on who they think deserves to win, they both admit Kris Perkins and Jon Buehler gave them the biggest run for their money.
"Every time I looked over my shoulder they were there," says Baker. "Jon and Kris were consistent."
Tuesday, Perkins and Buehler will battle it out against Kendra Bentley and Freddy Holliday, Hayden Kristianson and Aaron Crumbaugh, and Adam Malis and Rebecca Cardon for the $1 million prize.
source~
http://jam.canoe.ca/Television/2005/02/05/921485.html
