Exclusive: Joseph "Joey" Graceffa and Meghan Caramena talk 'The Amazing Race: All-Stars' (Part 2)

The Amazing Race: All-Stars eliminated Joseph "Joey" Graceffa and Meghan Caramena during Sunday night's third episode of the CBS reality competition's 24th overall season and third all-stars edition. 


The "Best Friends" team and YouTube personalities became the third pair eliminated from the around-the-world competition after they arrived at the Race's third Pit Stop at Tanjun Aru Water Village in Sabah, Malaysian Borneo, in last place.

In an exclusive interview with Reality TV World, Joey and Meghan recently talked about their The Amazing Race: All-Stars experience. Below is the concluding portion of their interview. Click here to read the first half.

Reality TV World: How long did it take you two to complete the Detour task in which you had to shoot the fake parrots and how long did you actually spend rafting down the river?

Joseph "Joey" Graceffa: Rafting down the river, I think, was like an hour-and-a-half. We had no trouble, really, except once we got caught on rocks. But it was nothing compared to like what the other teams were going through, like falling off their boats and stuff. Yeah.


Reality TV World: Well that's good at least.

Joseph "Joey" Graceffa: Yeah, for sure.

Reality TV World: So you guys definitely knew you were in last place when you met The Amazing Race host Phil Keoghan at the Pit Stop, right?

Joseph "Joey" Graceffa: Yeah.

Meghan Caramena: Yeah.


Joseph "Joey" Graceffa: We were joking with the taxi driver about stuff like, "Wow, we haven't seen another team in a long time. We're probably in first right now!"

Meghan Caramena: It was the saddest elimination ever, because I don't know if you noticed, but they had to move the mat because it started like pouring down rain. So yeah, it was just kind of sad.

Reality TV World: Did you think you had a good shot to get a non-elimination leg or were you not expecting that?

Joseph "Joey" Graceffa: Yeah, when we were building our raft, we were like, "Oh, well hopefully it will be a non-elimination!" We were kind of surprised that it wasn't.

Meghan Caramena: Yeah.


Reality TV World: Last night's episode made it look like you guys were going to work with John Erck and Jessica Hoel and Brendon Villegas and Rachel Reilly in the leg because you three teams were so far behind the pack. But viewers didn't really see much of that team work happening or you guys helping one another. Did the editing just leave that out or did that idea just kind of fall apart once the leg really began?

Meghan Caramena: No, John and Jessica saw that we had forgotten our taxi and they actually called one for us. So they helped us.

Joseph "Joey" Graceffa: Yeah, and plus none of us were really around each other. We all got split up, so there really wasn't a chance. We thought there was going to be some sort of equalizer and we were all going to work together if there was.

Reality TV World: Leo Temory and Jamal Zadran were shown helping Cord McCoy and Jet McCoy out during the Detour. Watching the episode back, did that surprise you since "The Afghanimals" obviously had kind of a bad reputation while racing their first time.

Joseph "Joey" Graceffa: Not really. Leo and Jamal are really nice guys, like, there's no reason when you have a three-hour lead on three teams to be doing stuff like that. If you're not going to be in first, why make enemies?


Reality TV World: So it sounds like you liked Leo and Jamal. But going into the Race, were you initially worried about them -- how they often told lies and tried to be manipulative and what not? I figured most of the teams would try to target them right away or something.

Joseph "Joey" Graceffa: We kind of talked to them and the Twinnies [Natalie Anderson and Nadiya Anderson] from the beginning. We were the teams that were the outcasts of our seasons and people hated us...

Meghan Caramena: (Laughs)

Joseph "Joey" Graceffa: ... So we all bonded over that and we trusted them. We could tell that they were genuine guys.

Meghan Caramena: Yeah, and the chemistry between all the teams, it wasn't cutthroat. Everyone was just happy to be on. It was just really cool. No one was trying to, like, lie to other people to get ahead. Everyone just kind of wanted to win. It's not like they're trying to make friends, but they weren't trying to make enemies either.


Reality TV World: So it sounds like there were no outcast this season! (Laughs)

Meghan Caramena: Yeah.

Joseph "Joey" Graceffa: Not in our experience.

Reality TV World: Meghan, during last week's episode, you stopped to help John with that toy car during the Roadblock. Do you regret that looking back, and I guess if you were to race again in the future, is that something you wouldn't do?

Meghan Caramena: In the future -- well the thing is, I helped John and at one point I was ready to go, but I stayed a little bit too long helping him. It didn't really show it in the edit, but that's what I regret, staying as long as I did.

But I don't regret helping him, because when I was there, he was shaking. It was so bad, and I felt like they were Bali all over again -- the last team looking for the surfboard. So, I don't want to speak for the future, but I don't regret helping him. But I do regret helping him for as long as I did, because that was a close race to the Pit Stop.


Reality TV World: Jet and Cord gave away their extra Express Pass in the prior leg to Jennifer Wayne and Caroline Cutbirth. Did you guys ever try to make a play for that? We didn't really see any of the teams sucking up to Jet and Cord, like what usually seems to happen.

Meghan Caramena: No. In our first season, we were never going to whore ourselves out there to try and get the Express Pass. If you still want to give it to us, cool, but it was never like, "Oh, we can't build a car! We're girls, we're helpless. Could you help us? Give us the Express Pass, please!" Like, no thank you.

Joseph "Joey" Graceffa: (Laughs)

Reality TV World: I was going to ask you, Meghan, more about that. You had said the way Caroline and Jennifer worked for that Express Pass and were running the Race was kind of a slap in the face to women everywhere. Could you elaborate on that? Do you think the girls were capable of doing tasks on their own but just tried to find the easy way out, or do you think they weren't capable of getting things done?

Meghan Caramena: They need -- well, for that one, in that situation, they were going home. There was no doubt about it. Everyone knew it. But in our season, they relied on everyone to help them get stuff done. They were always following the hockey players [Bates Battaglia and Anthony Battaglia].

They never did stuff on their own. It was a very true statement, so for them to get offended, it's not like I was being mean. That's not how I am. It's not the kind of person I am. But it was upsetting because they're back to their old tricks. It's like, why don't you just try to figure something out on your own?


Just try it for once! I mean, you may prove everyone else [wrong], but they couldn't. They had already given up. Once they got there, they realized it was over. Caroline was running around asking everyone for help. She was like basically crying. She was like, "I don't know how to do this! I don't know how to build a car! John can you help me?" And he was like, "No, you have to do it yourself."

It's just frustrating because I'm sitting there working on the car, figuring it out, and she's just running around already giving up. It's just embarrassing. I felt bad for them because it's just like, "Why don't you believe in yourself? Just get it done."

And there are young girls that watch them and they think like, "Oh, well, if I can't get something done, I'll complain about it and rely on someone else to get it done for me." I don't know. That's not the kind of role model I want to be. 

Reality TV World: You two obviously had some time to think about racing strategy before filming began. Did you two plan on doing anything differently this time around -- any ways to improve your race or anything like that?

Joseph "Joey" Graceffa: Well, there's really no preparation you can do for the Race. You never know what's going to get thrown at you. So I guess we just wanted to, like, keep our cool the entire time and just not get stressed out and lash out at each other and just try to enjoy the time that we have.

Meghan Caramena: Mhmm.


Reality TV World: How did your return to The Amazing Race come about? Had you been campaigning for it all along or did producers just contact you and it was a surprise?

Joseph "Joey" Graceffa: Yeah, they reached out again pretty shortly after our season had finished airing. That's when they started casting, so we've known for awhile.

Above is the concluding portion of Joey and Meghan's exclusive interview with Reality TV World. Click here to read the first half.






About The Author: Elizabeth Kwiatkowski