Kyle Wimberley, Lydia Blair, Samantha Hubbard, and Cara Kies, Million Dollar Secret
Netflix
[Warning: Spoilers for Million Dollar Secret Season 1 — including the identity of the winner — follow. Read at your own risk.]
Phew! That was intense.
The first season of Netflix’s new reality competition series Million Dollar Secret came to a close with a breathtaking finale endgame that left Corey Niles, Sam Hubbard, and Cara Kies with equal opportunities — but not equal influence — to win the grand prize of $1 million. The diabolical final challenge placed the players’ boxes, with Cara’s containing the cash prize, in front of each of them, and gave Corey and Cara — in that order, based on how they finished in the last challenge — the opportunity to privately move the contents of the boxes around in the hopes that the million dollars would end up in front of them.
When Sam and Cara left the room, Corey swapped what was in his box with Cara’s box, bringing the $1 million within his reach. When it was Cara’s turn, she had a million-dollar decision to make: If she suspected Corey correctly thought she was the millionaire, then Corey likely would have taken what was in her box, meaning the right play would be to swap again. But if Corey thought Cara knew he was on to her, he may not take what was in her box in a double bluff, and switching would mean literally handing the money over to Corey and losing everything she worked for. She decided to go with her gut and take what was in Corey’s box.
“It was so stressful,” Cara told TV Guide. “I’ve never been more nervous in my life.”
As they opened their boxes in the final moments, Cara, an In-N-Out line cook from California, fell to the ground in tears after realizing her big gamble had paid off and she was a million dollars richer.
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And that’s exactly how executive producer Glenn Hugill hoped it would happen when he was devising the game. As Hugill pitched the idea of this endgame, he asked his fellow producers to imagine a scenario in which the millionaire would swap their own box with someone else’s.
“Imagine having fought so hard to hold on to a million in this kind of backstabbing Olympics, and then have the balls to say, ‘I want to swap my box with that one over there,’ because you think they’re taking it,” Hugill told TV Guide. “Who is going to do that? Like, who will have the guts to do that? … Even talking about it, the hairs on my arm go up. I mean, the sheer guts she had!”
But Cara’s impressive gameplay started before the finale, when she had a premonition that the money would end up in her box after the money was moved away from Sam, the previous millionaire.
“I knew I was getting that money, and it was just the morning I woke up, it was just this overwhelming feeling that it’s coming, it’s here today,” Cara told TV Guide. “And when I opened it, and I knew [I had it], I was like, game on, this is it. This is not leaving me. I’m taking this all the way.”
Cara Kies, Million Dollar Secret
Netflix
Some might think that was too early to hold on to the million dollars, but Cara was ready for it and used the character she had played before she had the money — a caring, honest, trustworthy friend — to her advantage. The first sign that she had changed her strategy happened when Sam, armed with a clue that the millionaire had two sisters, asked her about her family. Surprisingly, Cara fibbed her butt off at just the right time, throwing Sam off her scent when she lied and said she only had one sister. It was a turning point in the game.
“I am a very intuitive person,” Cara told TV Guide. “I’ve always been since I was a kid, and I really lean on that. And when I had opened the [box and saw the] money, I knew someone was going to get a clue about me, and so I just said a prayer, and [I knew the question was going to be about] either my middle name being Lydia, or my sisters. … And so meeting with Sam, she got me good, because the way she asked me was so nonchalant, and [the lie] just came right out of my mouth. I didn’t even think about it. I was in a game mode of lying now, because I had the money, I gotta do whatever I gotta do to lie, and it just splurted out of my mouth, and I’m really proud of myself.”
Cara also made arguably her riskiest move earlier in the finale with four players left. Knowing that she had more social currency than Sydnee Falkner, a real gamer who had recently lost her alliance, Cara purposefully botched a dodge-the-laser challenge that meant either Sydnee or she would be leaving the game. She just had to hope that the winning team, Corey and Sam, would vote out Sydnee and not her. It was a 50-50 bet, but Cara was full of bold moves on her way to a million bucks.
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“I still have yet to lie to you guys,” Cara told her competition at the final elimination dinner, moments after lying her tail off. Corey and Sam believed her, and Sydnee went home. After that, it was all about sticking to her strategy, with a little assist from Sam.
“When Corey was downstairs getting the information [for the endgame], Sam and I were having a conversation upstairs, and I still thought she knew I had two sisters,” Cara said. “I still thought she was like, ready to cut me. And then she had mentioned, like, Corey is gonna take the box from me. And I was like, ‘Well, why wouldn’t he take it from me?’ She’s like, ‘What do you mean?’ And right then I was like, ‘Oh my gosh. She has no idea.’ Like, OK, now my mind’s boggling, and I’m taking her advice, but I had to remember now I know Corey knows I have it. He’s doing such a good job pretending he’s going for Sam, but I know him better than that, and that was ultimately, who knows who better. And he thought he played me, but ultimately it worked out in my favor.”
So what did she do with the money?
“My family, they’ve had a lot of hardships throughout the years, and I feel like one bad thing after another, and finally, something good happened for one of us,” she said. “It happens for all of us. And so it’s just incredible that it’s not just going to change my life and my husband’s life. It’s my family too, and they’re just over the moon and so proud.”
Not bad for a “burger flipper.” In the interest of journalism, we had to ask her what her favorite “secret menu” item from In-N-Out is. Unsurprisingly, the winner of the game who did things her own way also has a very unique favorite from what’s widely considered the best fast food joint in the country.
“Well, I make my own burger, and it’s not on the menu at all, and I would hate for people to ask for this, because it’s a pain in the butt to make,” she told TV Guide. “But because I make it, I can do it. I have a double meat, and I have my top bun, a regular bun, and then the bottom is protein, so it’s a half and half burger, and it’s my favorite thing ever. You get the best of both worlds.”
Million Dollar Secret is now streaming on Netflix.
