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Elder Allen explains how ‘The District’ was modeled after reality TV shows like ‘Survivor’

Two missionaries sit around a table with a camera crew
Photo by LDS Church Missionary Department

The missionary training series, “The District Series 1” and “The District Series 2,” were made in an effort to help teach new and current missionaries how to be Preach My Gospel missionaries, as well as help them gain realistic expectations of missionary life. They were also The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints’ first venture into reality television.

Elder Stephen Allen, who was the managing director of the Church’s Missionary Department at the time of their production, said the District series were real. “We didn’t invent anything, and part of the beauty of it is they’re not perfect.”

The goal of “The District” was to help prepare new missionaries to know what to expect, said Elder Allen, Faith Honn, a sophomore from Idaho with an undeclared major now serving in the Poland Warsaw Mission, said “The District” helped her prepare and know what to expect on her mission.

“I liked getting to see how people’s lives were affected by learning about the gospel. I liked how it showed the ups and downs of missionary work so people can have more realistic expectations. It made me feel more comfortable about going out since I knew more about what to expect.”

Behind the scenes

The idea for “The District” came to Allen when he was a stake president. He met a young man preparing to serve a mission and said this young man’s parents had not served missions. Allen had no experience or knowledge as to what a mission would be like, so he decided there should be a way to help people in the same situation. “And that’s where ‘The District 1’ was born,” said Allen.

When “The District” was first proposed, the idea of a reality television in the Church was unheard of, said Allen. “Reality TV at the time was brand new. ‘Survivor,’ ‘The Apprentice,’ it was all pretty new. We actually patterned ‘The District’ after ‘Survivor.’”

Elder Richard G. Scott of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles asked Allen if he thought it would work or even look real. Allen said he told him, “Absolutely, it’s going to work.”

The production of the first District was all uncharted territory, said Allen, but they picked a mission which was known for their missionaries’ ability to find people to teach. The production traveled to the Texas San Antonio Mission.

Selecting missionaries to appear in the production was long, said Allen, because it included visiting with the mission president, working with missionaries, and bringing full-time staff from the Provo Missionary Training Center to work in the mission field. After these tasks were completed, the production picked six missionaries to star in “The District Series 1.”

Filming for the first series of “The District” lasted three weeks. Afterward, the production packed up and returned to Salt Lake City. When one of the early edits of “The District” was shown to Elder Scott, Allen said he was shocked at how real it looked.

After serving in the New Zealand Auckland Mission, Austin Zacher, a sophomore from Montana majoring in exercise and sport science, said “The District” series helped him as a trainer.

“The missionaries I trained needed to learn English, so it was great because they saw a good example of how and what to do. It was a good chance for them to practice and understand their English.”