‘Big Brother Canada 3’ exclusive: Godfrey Mangwiza on strategy, TV moments, evicting Ashleigh

Godfrey Mangwiza was a heck of a fun guy to watch on “Big Brother Canada” this season. He was thoroughly entertaining on the live feeds, told great stories, and played an under-the-radar strategic game that was probably better than most gave him credit for over the course of the season. Unfortunately, he just ran into a brick wall known as Sarah in the final two, and could not get the votes needed. He also did not get many opportunities thrown his way.

We’re going to have more on this particular issue later, but Sindy told us today that the jury actually was meant to ask Godfrey more questions than they did, but they were thrown off after all that transpired. Basically either some people (she specifically name-drops JP and Bruno) didn’t follow the instructions as were laid out, or simply forgot.

CarterMatt – We know you’re a big personality, so how did you manage to stay so quiet early on in the game, especially when I’m sure you wanted to speak out or voice your opinion at times.

Godfrey – I’ll tell you: This should be a ‘Big Brother’ rule. You stay on the down-low for the first few weeks, and you get the feel [for the game]. I know a lot of people want to go in and make alliances right away, without knowing who these people really were, whether they were rational players or not. I waited, I learned who was smart, and I chose who I wanted to work with at the end.

You say that didn’t really have any alliances, but would you saw that you were closer to Bruno than anyone else?

Absolutely, man. Bruno and I weren’t necessarily a down-to-the-end alliance, mostly because I knew I couldn’t beat Bruno. The guy was a father, but he was still a great guy to work with. I wanted to keep my options open to work freely around the house on a week-to-week basis. As I liked to say in the house, my word expires every week!

That’s a great line, and you had a lot of these this season with the speeches in the big TV moments! Did you plan some of these out in advance?

I just spoke from the heart. I figured is that people would be less threatened by me. If I wasn’t going after them, then they had less reason to be threatened by me, you know?

Let’s talk about the JP vote. While people who watched the feeds knew you were pretty great throughout, that was your first big moment on the show. A lot of people have given Sindy a ton of credit for the move, but what did you do to make sure you kept yourself safe?

Everyone who is in the ‘Big Brother’ house knows that you don’t just make moves on your own. The people who all voted for, I had to work for that. I had to suppress their doubt, make them want to vote with me, and make them paranoid that if I go home, [they would be in danger]. It worked perfect! With Sindy back in the house, I knew [she] wanted to make a big move. With Bobby and Bruno, all I had to say is say ‘these people are coming after you. Do the smart thing.’ I do credit them for the move, but it wouldn’t have [happened] had I not put in the work.

After that you were really great at going to different groups and saying that you were with them, but these people never talked to each other! How did you make each alliance feel like you were with them?

I noticed right away that people were coupling up, and I knew that sooner or later they would have to bust each other up. I told them ‘I can be your third guy,’ and I made sure that they were people who did not talk game to each other so that I was never exposed. And on top of that I didn’t put a name to it like the Diaper or the Cobras. I just said ‘hey guys, don’t vote me out, and I won’t vote you out.’

That’s interesting. So you think that giving an alliance a name is really putting a big target on yourself?

Alliances are really detrimental, especially when you put a name to it. Everyone identifies the alliance. If you are with people and you never put a name to it [or make it public], you can be like ‘hey, I wasn’t in an alliance. I was just working with them then.’

When I talked to you before the season you said that you were going to keep being a psychology student a secret. Did you succeed?

To be honest, after the Triple Eviction people started getting suspicious, thinking that I was starting to say some really profound stuff. They were like ‘Godfrey man, do you have a degree or something?’ I had to play dumb to make sure that no one found out. I’m telling you man, they were onto me after a while.

I spoke to Zach during exit interviews, and he claimed that you were walking around telling people that your ‘Big Brother’ idol was Victoria. Is that true? 

(Laughs.) That is absolutely false. These people are superfans, they know the game and were so eager to share all of their knowledge. I [acted like I didn’t] know anything about ‘Big Brother,’ so when they asked me I just picked somebody who I knew totally sucked because I’m like ‘hey, look at me! I don’t know the game so Victoria’s the best.’

Dr. Will was somebody who won the game without winning competitions, and you only one two competitions and one of them was in part just because there was a money prize at the end of it. How much do you think that winning comps is overrated, because if you keep yourself safe you don’t need to win comps?

Winning competitions, it’s funny you say that because Dr. Will is one of the legends I modeled my game after. I said I didn’t want to play the game in a way that I have to rely on comps, because it’s a risk. What if you have one that’s not built for you? It’s totally overrated. It’s a social game. The point is not to get people out; it’s to be not taken out. That was my philosophy. You can just sit back, relax, don’t get blood on your hands, and focus on making good relationships with people.

I know you’ve been asked this a lot, but did you get a chance to talk with people about what their vote would have been if it was you and Ashleigh at the end?

To be honest I haven’t really asked the other people yet. I really think it was a toss-up. Ashleigh played this game with huge alliances, and half of the jury are people were people who were aligned with her. Sarah didn’t have many alliances, but she had so much blood on her hands that the jury would probably respect that. The vote, it was more based slightly on emotion. I said that I just wanted to take the honorable road, I want to pick the person who I would be able to sleep at night if I lost to, and that was Sarah. She played a phenomenal game, and I wanted to go to the end with someone I thought was the best. (Note: For the record, Ashleigh said in her exit interview that she probably would have won against Godfrey if he took her, but it would have been a closer vote.)

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We came out of this interview being for the most part even more impressed with Godfrey’s game. He made very few mistakes, and the only one that you could argue (taking Sarah to the end) is understandable since he may have assumed that Ashleigh had at least three of Diapers locked in and maybe more.

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