Season 5 of Special Forces: World’s Toughest Test came to an end with the November 12 finale. Candace Cameron Bure, Alexia Umansky, and Collin Gosselin were the three recruits who successfully passed the course after eight days of intense training.
The last two days of the course included a grueling trek through the Malaysian jungle, followed by a night of torture and relentless interrogation. It was in the interrogation phase that Cameron Bure pulled out her years of acting experience.
“Listen, I pulled out so many tears on that last day and those weren’t because I was scared,” the Full House star tells TV Insider. “I was just acting because I was thinking … even when you had those headphones on and you’re being tortured with sound and it’s such a long day, I kept thinking there’s got to be strategy involved in the interrogation. And I didn’t know, aside from building rapport with them, what they were really looking for.”
When Cameron Bure was being questioned about why she was in Malaysia in military garb, she was “kind of trying to manipulate what they would want me to say,” she explained. “I was trying to guess it.”
She, David Charvet, Alycia Baumgardner, and Gosselin came up with a cover story that they were actors preparing for a film about being in the military. “I was fake crying, saying, ‘I’m just an actor! I’m just an actor!’” Cameron Bure recalls. And it was kind of crazy, but I was playing the game as well as I could. What you see in there … I was using some acting skills.”
Pete Dadds/Fox
Below (and in the video above), Cameron Bure breaks down her experience on the Special Forces course, including how she powered through the stomach flu and more.
Take me back to that moment when it was you, Alexia and Collin, and they told you that you passed. What was happening in that moment?
Candace Cameron Bure: Well, I was shocked when we were back in the square and it was just the three of us. I was looking for everyone else. And I honestly didn’t know that it was the end of the day and that they were going to make final selection. I thought we were going to go through another event and they just chose the three of us to do that together. And then when they did final selection and said, “You actually passed,” I was shocked, but I was still confused. It’s just … you’re up for over 24 hours. You’ve been tortured. And so there’s so much going through your head and it’s overwhelming. But once it finally hit me, I was like, “I did it. I did it.” I was so happy. It was happy for the three of us, but also sad that the other people weren’t there. It was this weird, conflicting set of emotions, but I was proud.
When you look back on the course as a whole, is there anything that kind of stands out as the hardest part, whether it be physically or mentally?
All of the challenges were physically demanding and difficult, but when I look back, they were so fun. Who gets the opportunity to jump out of a helicopter and scale a 22 story building and climb down a rope ladder on a suspension bridge? They were incredible. And I think to myself, “Wow, I did that and had the opportunity to.” So it’s really cool to look back on. And then as far as the mental aspect, it was grueling and challenging. And I just know that none of us could have gotten as far as we did without our teammates. There was so much good camaraderie between all of us, and that’s one of my biggest takeaways from the show.
Well, you even got sick there for a little bit at the end. So how were you able to power through that?
Listen, I’ve never looked more awful and unrecognizable on television in my entire life. It’s like … my face was so eaten up with mosquito bites. I had the stomach flu. We hadn’t slept for 24 hours, terrible lighting on top of it, but I was drained of everything and you can see it. I mean, even my husband kind of looked at the clip and he’s like, “Wait, that’s you? I’ve never seen you look like that.” And I’m like, “I’ve never seen myself look like that either.”
Pete Dadds/Fox
Being sick … I mean, that was just the mental game. I knew we were at the end and I was like, “I am not quitting because of the stomach bug. I am going to do everything that I can to just keep going, take another step, take another breath.” And I thought about my family so much because they really encouraged me … [my husband] Val did with the video that he sent in. And it was at that point that I thought to myself like, “I’m not quitting. I am not quitting.”
Take me through coming up with that cover story with your team at the end. Who spearheaded that?
David spearheaded that story and it was smart because you have to keep it as close to reality as possible because if they can even sniff a little lie, you are out. And so David and I are actors and it made perfect sense that Alycia is a boxer and they could have still hired her as an actor to box in the movie. And then Collin is this reality star and that’s great marketing for a movie. So we felt like the story really made sense and we were trying to go over as many details so we were consistent within those stories. But those interrogators, they surprise you with the questions and when you’re answering them, you’re trying to make sure it’s believable, but also not give too much information where someone else on your team might give different information. And so it’s frightening.
Who was the first person you were able to call when you found out you passed?
Well, I called my family as soon as I got back. I called my husband and my kids. We didn’t have cell phones. We didn’t have contact with anyone. So it was exciting. They knew that I must have made it because they hadn’t heard from me the entire course. So on that very last day I was like, “I did it.” And they were like, “We knew you would. We had no doubt.”
The DS seemed so impressed with you and obviously they’re yelling in your face a lot of the times, but they also, I think, gave you a lot of compliments too. Were you surprised at how good that rapport was between you and them?
It’s really interesting because I never heard any of their compliments until I watched the show back. They’re just beating you up verbally, breaking you down. And so I didn’t even know what they were saying about me. They never encouraged me in person. So I was surprised watching the show back when they were like, “Oh my gosh, we had no belief in her, but she keeps coming back.”
Pete Dadds/Fox
I was like a cat with nine lives. I just kept coming back to life. And yeah, it was nice to hear that they were surprised. They kind of were digging at me in the beginning too, especially when I was boxing Alexia. They were like, “She’s old. She’s old. This young girl’s going to just beat her up.” And I won that challenge and it was like, “Hey guys, I have a little more than you think in me.”
You were the oldest person to pass of the three. How do you stay in such good physical shape in general?
Training’s been just a part of my life. I always want to be healthy and in the last couple of years I kicked it up a notch because I want to be around a long time. So physical fitness is just important to me and it definitely helped. You can’t get through that course without having some level of physicality.
Which of your Full House co-stars do you think would do best on the course? Or who do you want to see?
I would love to see Lori Loughlin
She should do it with her daughter…
That would be incredible if they did it together. She’s a tough cookie too, so I would just love to see her go through it. I think there would probably be too much mud for John Stamos and his hair when he wouldn’t do it for that reason. I kid, I’m kidding.
What would you tell someone if someone in your life was going to go on the show, what would you tell them beforehand?
I would tell them you can do it. You are strong enough. You are capable and have the experience because we always, I think, cut ourselves short. We can mentally say, no, and don’t even allow ourselves to go through the process to see what we’re fully capable of. And so this is an opportunity to do it and not many people get an experience like this, so take it.
Do you feel like you got everything out of this experience that you wanted to?
Yeah, I do. I do. I really wanted to complete the course and I did. So I was so proud of myself.