The Mole (Australian TV series)

The Mole
Season six title card
Genre	Reality
Created by	Bart De Pauw
Presented by	Grant Bowler (2000–3) Tom Williams (2005) Shura Taft (2013)
Theme music composer	Jay Stewart
Country of origin	Australia
Original language(s)	English
No. of seasons	6
No. of episodes	64
Production
Executive producer(s)	David Mason
Location(s)	Tasmania, Australia (2000) Victoria, Australia (2001) Gold Coast, Queensland, Australia (2002) New Caledonia (2003) New Zealand (2005)
Running time	43 minutes
Release
Original network	Seven Network
Picture format	576i (SDTV)
Audio format	Stereo
Original release	27 February 2000 – 28 October 2005 2 July 2013 – 16 October 2013
Chronology
Related shows	The Mole
External links
Website
Production website

The Mole was an Australian reality television series that aired on the Seven Network. It is based on The Mole franchise of programs that have aired in numerous countries. The sub-title for the Australian version of the show was a simple question: Who is the traitor?. Its most recent season aired in 2013.

The series is a reality competition in which the contestants work as a group to add money to a kitty that only one of them will win. Among the contestants is one person who has been designated "the Mole" by the producers and is tasked with sabotaging the group's money-making efforts. His or her identity is unknown until the end of the series, when two genuine contestants take a final quiz in the final episode regarding details of the Mole. At the end of each episode, the contestant who knows the least about who the mole is, as decided by the results of a quiz, is eliminated from the game.

The series was hosted by actor Grant Bowler in its first four seasons, and subsequently by Tom Williams, who filled in for Bowler in the fifth season due to a prior commitment on Bowler's part, and Shura Taft. The first three seasons, as well as the sixth, all took place in Australia, but the fourth and fifth were set in New Caledonia and New Zealand respectively. The first season was produced by Mason Media Group. Seasons two to five were produced within Seven and Executive Produced by David Mason. The sixth season was produced by Fremantle Media Australia.

Contestants typically meet each other very shortly before shooting begins. However, in season six, contestants only met each other as a whole group for the first time upon completion of the very first assignment of the game, which saw them split into three groups of four, blindfolded and left at an unknown destination.

Unlike in the American version of the show, player alliances are quite rare and are considered, by many players in fact, cheating. Only the most informal, friendship-based groups ever took shape, and only in Seasons 2 and 5. Season 6 had many alliances formed, in part due to the fact that exemptions were now tangible items that could be traded freely and the introduction of freebies saw players using them as currency or bribes.