The Mole is like a Ferrari, says executive producer Chris Culvenor about the whodunit reality competition that, since its inception more than two decades ago, has seen multiple seasons and spin-offs in nearly 20 different countries. “Maybe you want to put on new rims,” Culvenor tells Tudum, but anything more than that would stray too far from the original greatness.

Culvenor and his colleagues knew they didn’t want to completely change the show for this reboot. “We went through a lot of the history and tried to look at what challenges worked really, really well and how we could refresh them for [the current era],” he explains. “So we owe a lot of the show’s strength to all the work that’s been done by production teams all around the world before us.”

The most important factor, of course, is casting the Mole — the player chosen to sabotage the as those same players try to uncover their identity. But finding the perfect candidate is a really difficult task — but if the last two seasons of The Mole taught us anything, it’s that there are some people who are born to play the part. Below, Culvenor, as well as showrunner David Tibballs, answer your most burning questions from Seasons 1 and 2 about the Mole and how the arrangement works throughout filming.

What makes a perfect Mole?

“If you look at all the versions of The Mole throughout the world, there’s no archetype that you can point to,” says Culvenor. “There’s no checklist that you go through because this show is scrutinized so much, and has so many superfans, that if you ever started ticking things off in the checklist, people would pick it like that.”

“That being said, the person you select needs to be able to withstand incredible pressure,” he continues. “It’s a person who’s going to love the challenge, be somewhat excited by the chaos and the fun, but also be able to withstand that scrutiny. They need to be able to calibrate moves, so they need to have quite an analytical mind about when to strike and when to pull back.”

How is the Mole chosen?

“First and foremost, you’re casting your favorite 12 people with diversity in mind — and that’s diversity of background, personality type, but also diversity of how they might play the game,” says Culvenor. “And then, within that mix, you decide who would make the best Mole. I don’t think [we] go into it with ‘this person is the Mole’ or not, but it becomes very clear. We spend a lot of time with these people. We get to know them really well. As we dive in and work with them more and more, you start to really see who could withstand this incredible test.”

What are the qualities you look for in a good Mole?

“The ability to keep cool under pressure,” says Culvenor. “You want someone who is going to be excited by the opportunity, because it’s a stressful thing to do — to sabotage people who you are playing with — but they’re someone who can see the fun in it. I don’t mean that in an evil way! It’s someone who’s going to embrace the chaos of it all. Someone you can imagine being really good at deception and sabotage if they were put to it.”

“You can tie yourself in knots when you decide who’s going to be the Mole in the same way you tie yourself in knots when you’re trying to work out who the Mole is — [with] some candidates you’re like, ‘Oh, OK, of course that person would be too obvious, but if it’s too obvious, does that mean that they’re not obvious?’ You can go down a mole hole of trying to work out who’s the Mole and who’s not, and we went down similar mole holes when we decided who it should be as well.”

Someone Teams Up With The Mole | The Mole S1E9Sabatoge at the top of a mountain.

Are you ever worried that the Mole can’t pull it off?

“Yeah, of course,” says Culvenor. “We’ve had huge faith in our Mole, but also we’ve understood the intense pressure that they are under. I think the really interesting thing about the format is that people’s suspicions change so much. Every move that someone makes shifts people’s points of view. There was never a time that we were going to go into freak-out mode, but certainly there’s a lot at stake.”

During the editing process, is there a mandate about when to highlight each contestant as a possible Mole?

“The majority of the producers and editors don’t know, so they cut it in a way that really follows the whodunit mystery that the cast is going through. For those of us who know and are overseeing the edit, you want to make sure there’s enough instances and clues within that people could theoretically figure it out, but not give it away too easily. It’s like any great Agatha Christie novel: There’s got to be enough breadcrumbs that someone could go, ‘Oh, of course,’ but if you found out who did it in the first chapter, it’s no fun to play.”

Does the host know the identity of the Mole when you’re filming?

“No. They doesn’t know until the end, just like all of us. [For Season 1,] I think there were only five people on the planet who knew who the Mole was until it was revealed.”

How does the Mole get the special information they need? Is there someone on set who pulls them aside? Do you pull other contestants aside too, just to mess with everybody’s brains?

“There was a specific producer who was the Mole whisperer, and that person did exactly what you just said. They find quiet moments with them to have those discussions, but as you’ve quite accurately pointed out, if that person is having quiet discussions with one person and one person only, it becomes obvious. So that person often sees everyone and has discussions about how things are going, but has a very different discussion with our Mole. Literally the only time [we contact the Mole] is a voice discussion with no one else in the room, apart from those two people.”

Do you give the Mole specific things you want them to do in order to sabotage, or do you say, “Here’s what’s going to happen, do your thing?”

“We love to give the Mole that freedom,” says Culvenor. “That’s part of the fun, I think, because it’s their game to play as well. So we give them the setup, and we give them the pivot points where there’s going to be moments of success or failure. We spell that out for them, but then it’s their decision about when to strike and when to not. If you strike too often, too quickly, you’ll give it up. So a lot of what the Mole needs to do is decide when they go under the radar, and when they feel it’s a good time to do some sabotage.”

Julian Panetta/Netflix

What does the Mole win, if anything? What's positioned to them as the incentive to go through with this?

“They don’t ‘win’ anything,” Tibballs tells Tudum. “The Mole works for the producers and is paid a fee to take on the role. That’s a guaranteed sum of money in a game in which only one player takes home the prize pot.  And it’s a chance to play an iconic role in reality TV!”

Why did you choose the Season 2 Mole in particular? Were you ever nervous during filming that they would give themselves away with their particular gameplay (being sometimes overly obvious in order to throw suspicion)?

“The Mole was chosen after extensive interviews with all 12 of the final cast members,” Tibballs continues. “We took into account their personality traits and their answers to key questions to decide who would be a great Mole.  Without giving anything away, it was about our belief in their ability to sustain a lie for six weeks straight and someone who would enjoy the role and never crack! It is a highly stressful role!”