Get to Know the Big Brother 15 Houseguests

It's summertime and the living is easy...except on the hit game show Big Brother where lying and backstabbing are the order of the day and revenge is a dish best served cold — with a heaping side of slop! The 15^th installment of the popular CBS franchise, hosted by Julie Chen, will return Wednesday (8/7c) with two new twists that are sure to stun the contestants and trigger seismic shifts in the game. Instead of two houseguests being nominated for eviction each week, the players will now nominate three. Plus, BB viewers will play a key role in the outcome of the game when they get to vote each week for the contestant they feel is playing the best game — the Big Brother MVP — and the winner will be given a special secret power.

TV Guide Magazine sat for a chat with the sequestered houseguests to get their juiciest deets just before they met each other and entered the game. Who plans to lie about her perfectly legal but highly unpopular occupation? Who is most likely to send the CBS censors into cardiac arrest? And who is related to a highly polarizing BB contestant from the past? Expect the unexpected!

Kaitlin Barnaby
Age: 23
Hometown: Vadnais Heights, Minn.
Occupation: Bartender
Marital Status: Single
Truth be told, this ravishing beauty isn't a Big Brother fan. In fact, she'd never seen a single episode of the show when she was discovered by one of its talent scouts in the Minneapolis bar where she works. "When you pour drinks for a living you encounter pretty much every type of personality and disgusting behavior there is," Barnaby says with a laugh. "I doubt there's anything that'll throw me in the BB house." She'll easily out drink the male houseguests on those rare nights when booze is provided. "I can slam back eight shots of Jameson and be totally fine," she says. "I'm not proud of that but, hey, it might come in handy."

Spencer Clawson
Age: 31
Hometown: Conway, Ark.
Occupation: Railroad Conductor
Marital Status: Single
This burly, bearded teddy bear says his goal is to "play the best social game ever in the history of Big Brother." And he plans to do it the old-fashioned way. "I'm going to earn my place in the house, not by being some hard-bodied waiter who got picked for his looks, but for being likable," Clawson says. "Let's face it, I'm no sexual threat. No chick's gonna be saying, 'I wanna have a showmance with Spencer!' But I do plan to get in the friend zone with all of the women, because when they're comfortable and confident, the information flies. I'm real good at braiding hair and having girl talk."

Judd Daughtery
Age: 26
Hometown: Englewood, Tenn.
Occupation: Property Appraiser
Marital Status: Single
"I don't seem like the sharpest knife in the drawer but underestimate me at your peril," says the drawling, slo-mo Daughtery, a BB junkie since age 13. "I'm a very outgoing guy — the type who's never met a stranger — but I'm here to win the game, not make friends. I have more than enough friends back home." His potential downfall? Panic attacks. His secret weapon? Daughtery barely sleeps. "I can easily get by on three or four hours max," he says. "So while everyone else in the house is out cold I'll be up plotting and scheming all night long!"

Aaryn Gries
Age: 22
Hometown: San Angelo, Texas
Occupation: College Student
Marital Status: Single
She digs Daisy Dukes, four-wheeling and beer and — let's get this right out in the open — she thinks "girls suck." Gries, a lingerie model and a student at University of Texas-San Marcos majoring in psychology, says her school is "very cliquey, which is really crappy and not the way I was raised!" She's up for a showmance, as long as the guy's sincere. "The worst thing would be if I thought we were in love and he's in the diary room saying horrible things to America behind my back. That would be devastating. Uh...unless I win the half mill. Then I'll be, like, 'Hey sucker, I'm rich and you're an a--hole!'"

David Girton
Age: 25
Hometown: San Diego
Occupation: Former lifeguard
Marital Status: Single
This mop-topped surfer dude isn't very driven — in fact, he was shocked to find out that his gig as a lifeguard last summer required more than looking good. "I'm just not into all that paramedic-EMT stuff," says Girton. "So now maybe I'm thinking about being a model or an actor. Maybe do like a Brad Pitt sort of thing, ya know?" Life, he observes, "can be very confusing. My parents are ex-hippies who used to smoke weed and the whole enchilada. Now my dad's rich and conservative. My mother watches The View and The Talk. Sometimes I don't know what to think...so I don't."

Andy Herren
Age: 26
Hometown: Aurora, Ill.
Occupation: Professor
Marital Status: Single
Be warned. "Some people think I'm way too loud and that my personality is a bit much," says the flamboyant Herren, who teaches a college course in public speaking and recently structured an entire final exam around the movie Mean Girls. His fave BB player? Season 12's Ragan. "I thought he was supercute and adorable and I had a major crush on him. In fact, we're so alike — he's also a teacher with a very similar background — I was worried the BB producers weren't going to take me. The best quote ever? When Ragan said to Rachel, 'The only thing that's real about you are the pimples on your chin!' It was so awesome."

Helen Kim
Age: 37
Hometown: Falls Church, Va.
Occupation: Political Consultant
Marital Status: Married mom
No one will want to hear that the Chicago-based Kim is a political lobbyist — or that she's married to a judge — so she "plans to lie and play it a little scatterbrained" in the BB house. "I'm really good at persuasion and negotiation but I'm going to stay the hell away from politics," says Kim, who has worked the campaigns of several congressmen, including Republican Jerry Weller of Illinois. "I plan to play up the fact that I'm a mother of two because, well, everyone likes moms, right?" She often feels alone in her intense devotion to BB. Sighs Kim: "No one in my universe watches the show."

Jessie Kowalski
Age: 25
Hometown: Beaumont, Texas
Occupation: Unemployed
Marital Status: Single
The only thing she's leaving behind is her precious chiweenie Ari Gold, named after the jerkwad agent on Entourage. "When I say I'm moving into the Big Brother house, I'm really moving in," claims Kowalski, who lost her computer-software job three months ago and has recently been living on a friend's couch. "I have no ties, no money, no nothing!" On the upside, she's got a connection — though somewhat slight — to the popular BB12 player Lane Elenburg, who took home the $50,000 runner-up prize. "Lane's brother's ex-wife is one of my sister's really good friends," says Kowalski. "I'm hoping his luck rubs off on me!"

Jeremy McGuire
Age: 23
Hometown: Katy, Texas
Occupation: Former boat shop employee
Marital Status: Single
He's a good boy who does what his mama tells him — and that includes applying for BB! "My mom is a totally crazy superfan of the show and was always begging me to try out," says McGuire. "When she found out I'd been picked, she just about peed herself. I can't disappoint her. I gotta come home with a big, fat check." Of course, she'll be watching every episode...closely. "My big weakness in the game is that I'm a real lover of the ladies," McGuire admits. "I'm all for a showmance but, hopefully, I won't get sucked into something I'll regret. My mom knows me all too well. She's, like, 'Don't you go on TV and be a dirty boy!'"

McCrae Olson
Age: 23
Hometown: Zimmerman, Minn.
Occupation: Pizza delivery boy
Marital Status: Single
Due to an 11^th-hour switch in houseguests, the über-tressed McCrae was not made available to the press for interviews. His bio reveals that he's into comics, is deathly afraid of ventriloquist dummies and that he considers watching Season 2 winner Dr. Will play BB "like watching the most beautiful ballet ever." Oh, and he's concerned about losing his privacy in the BB house. Good luck with that.

Howard Overby
Age: 29
Hometown: Hattiesburg, Miss.
Occupation: Youth counselor
Marital Status: Single
"There's never been an African-American winner on BB. Why not me?" says Overby. "So many of the kids I work with in the community don't know that there's a bigger world out there. They need dreams. They need inspiration. Not only am I representing my race, I'm representing people of faith." The BB houseguest he most admires is Kaysar, the Season 6 Muslim who always made time for prayer. The Bible-toting Overby plans to do the same. But can he win this high-stakes game without breaking a commandment or two? "Maybe not," Overby says, "but if I make an infraction I'll turn the diary room into a confessional. My Higher Power will get a lot of airtime."

Elissa Slater
Age: 27
Hometown: Concord, N.C.
Occupation: Nutritionist
Marital Status: Married mom
She's here, bitches! Slater is the sister of notorious Season 13champ Rachel Reilly and, though the resemblance is obvious, she's hoping to keep the connection a secret in the BB house as long as possible. Or will the waterworks be a dead giveaway? "Rachel cried a whole lot and I think I'm even more emotional than she is," says Slater. "On the other hand, I'm not so in-your-face. I'm going to be way more socially savvy than Rachel was. People will think of me as more of an asset than a threat." Her potential downfall: "I want everyone to be a healthy eater. It might drive the other players nuts."

Candice Stewart
Age: 29
Hometown: New Orleans
Occupation: Pediatric speech therapist
Marital Status: Single
Who's better prepared for the rigors of BB than this former NFL cheerleader? Stewart works with kids who have autism and Down Syndrome at a small speech clinic in Houston, so she clearly has patience to spare. She was displaced by Hurricane Katrina and separated for months from her family, proving she's got true grit. She also competed as Miss Louisiana in the Miss USA pageant in 2005. "When you're on lockdown for a month with 50 other girls it really tests your limits, so I have no worries about living in close quarters with them on BB," Stewart says. "I know all about those reindeer games." 

Nick Uhas
Age: 28
Hometown: Hilliard, N.Y.
Occupation: Entrepreneur
Marital Status: Single
He's the one to watch. A classic overachiever, the whip-smart, go-for-broke Uhas has studied pre-med, worked as a professional stunt rollerblader and launched a successful apparel company. He also circumnavigated the globe in — sorry, Jules Verne — 79 days. "By the time I'm on my deathbed, I want to be a serial entrepreneur of experiences," says Uhas. "That's the real reason I'm on BB — for the experience, not the money. I want to win this thing, even if all they hand me in the end is a blue ribbon." Fun Fact: Uhas is a bottomless well of useless trivia. "That's why," he notes, "my nickname is Nickapedia."

GinaMarie Zimmerman
Age: 32
Hometown: Brooklyn, N.Y.
Occupation: Pageant Coordinator
Marital Status: Single
People call her The Italian Barbie. "They see the long blond hair and the perfect boobs and think I must be totally stuck up — but I ain't!" says Zimmerman. "I'm just a 'Hey, wassup? How ya doin'?' kinda gal." She's really enjoying her freedom these days, having just ended a stifling, four-year, live-in relationship with her fiancé, and is not looking for love in the BB house. Who needs it when you have a tiara to keep you warm? Says Zimmerman: "I'm bringing the crown I won in the 2003 Miss International pageant and plan to wear it in the HOH room. Not that I'm rubbing it in."

Amanda Zuckerman
Age: 28
Hometown: Long Island, N.Y.
Occupation: Real estate agent
Marital Status: Single
This busty, bawdy, third-generation realtor — and Chelsea Handler wannabe — reveals she's "a Jewish-American princess who's totally into shock value. I'll be the girl in the BB house most likely to have a nipple slip. Oh, who am I kidding? Two days into the show I'll be running around stark naked looking like Sasquatch!" She can't wait for her many ex-boyfriends to see her on the program — "Talk about revenge! D-----bags!" — but she plans to remain loyal to a guy back home she's been dating for just two months. "That doesn't mean I won't be sexually harassing the men in the house," Zuckerman says. "Love me or hate me, I am who I am."

(Full disclosure: TVGuide.com is owned by CBS.) 

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