Julie Chen Moonves Calls Mystery Houseguest ‘Polarizing’ on ‘Big Brother’

We are now officially one week away from the 90-minute July 10 season 27 premiere of Big Brother on CBS. The network recently revealed the Hotel Mystère house theme along with a bevy of premiere night twists, including a masked visitor, a secret accomplice, and a mystery houseguest, but according to host Julie Chen Moonves, not everyone is going to be happy with the identity of the aforementioned mystery houseguest.

Chen Moonves tells Entertainment Weekly that she was shocked when told who the mystery houseguest was. And she goes on to say the figure will be very polarizing for viewers, leading to what the Chenbot thinks will be “a strong reaction in both directions.” (More polarizing than Pandora’s Box?)

Does that mean an infamous Big Brother or other reality TV veteran is about to check in to Hotel Mystère? Or could it be someone from the political world, such as when Anthony “The Mooch” Scaramucci entered (and then left) the Celebrity Big Brother house? The host would not say, but her comments can’t help but pique interest for premiere night. Here’s what else she told us to expect… besides the unexpected, of course.

ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: Let’s start real broad. What can you tell me about this season of Big Brother?

JULIE CHEN MOONVES: What I can tell you is there are so many layers of mystery, and it’s a new level of expect the unexpected, because things are not what they appear. So you’re going to see things and you’re going to think either nothing of it or think, “Oh, that’s ordinary, but it’s not.” And this will happen all season long, and slowly things will start revealing themselves. You’ve got to be a detective this year to play this game.

How does that play into the house theme with this Hotel Mystère situation?

Well, we’re going to see how good these houseguests are with their observation skills. Every season they memorize things and are like, “Oh yeah, there’s how many of these on the wall?” But it’s not so much that this year. There’s going to be dual meaning and dual purpose to things physically in the house.

You’ve walked around the house. What is your favorite room or tidbit or nook or cranny in there? I’m loving the bunk beds, not only because we haven’t had bunk beds since season 1, but because it looks like something like a train — a first class train you would take across Europe in the 1920s throwback. It’s like the Orient Express or something that, to me, looks very elegant and a lot of fun.

Your premiere is going to have a masked visitor, a secret accomplice, and a mystery houseguest. What can you say about all these twists and additional elements?

What I can say is the mystery houseguest, when I was told who this person is, I had to expect the unexpected! I never expected that person. And I was very excited because, in my opinion, getting that person is epic. And that person is also very polarizing. So there’s going to be a strong reaction in both directions for this mystery houseguest.

The accomplice this person’s going to have — they’re going to have responsibilities, and they may or may not be able to pull it off, and that will affect the game. And the masked visitor — very disruptive, and on another level that is more far reaching than Ainsley last year. Ainsley could do only so much, but this masked visitor is going to wreak havoc in ways that we’ve never seen before. And I would say on a deeper level. Much deeper. It’s more three dimensional.

Related: Big Brother 27 to feature all-new players, earlier premiere date, and longer episodes

Last season, you all switched to a three-nominee format for a lot of the season with the AI Arena. I loved it and it seemed like the audience were fans of it. What did you think of it and is that something we might see at some point in the future?

Yeah, I was a huge fan of it, as was everyone internally. I don’t know if you know this, but last summer it worked so well, so we extended it. Because it wasn’t supposed to go on for as long as it did. The reason I liked it so much is because at the beginning of each season, there tends to be this herd mentality where there’s no surprise on eviction night because the whole house goes one way.

You see people who won’t even give a sympathy vote in the direction of their buddy because they don’t want to stick their neck out and they don’t want to become the next target. And in the past, that made eviction night in the first few weeks not that surprising or exciting as to who was going to go. So things that work well tend to make an appearance again. I mean, look at the Power of Veto. That became a staple after season 3. So I would say it’s like shaking the Magic 8 Ball — signs are pointing to yes.

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