The Untold Truth Of Johnny Bananas

A reality TV contestant with the name of Johnny Bananas (well a nickname anyway) was always going to create their fair share of headlines. And the man born John Amadeus Devenanzio did just that during his multiple stints on MTV's long-running hit "The Challenge."

In fact, Bananas essentially built a career on causing chaos in "The Real World" spinoff, whether that entailed being turned into a human backpack by Chris "CT" Tamburello, reportedly duct-taping Amanda Garcia in a prank that got out of hand, or denying partner Sarah Rice more than a quarter-million dollars. With friends like these, eh! Per Entertainment Weekly, the West Coast native has appeared on no fewer than 20 seasons, winning a record seven and raking in a lot of money along the way.

But it turns out that there's more to Bananas than acting the boo-hiss villain in an extreme challenge elimination show. From humanitarian efforts and tabloid romances to bizarre lawsuits and side hustles, here's a look at his untold truth.

Johnny Bananas has not only appeared on a ton of seasons of MTV's "The Challenge," but has graced spinoff-from-spinoffs such as "Champs vs. Stars" and hosted a podcast for The Ringer about the unscripted reality genre. But the Penn State graduate still isn't afraid to tell it like it is about the MTV juggernaut responsible for his entire career.

In a 2021 interview with E! News, Bananas argued the last few seasons of "The Challenge" — coincidentally the ones that he didn't appear in — had lacked the usual spark. The seven-time winner took particular umbrage with the increasing number of newbies to the franchise as well as the amount of unnecessary twists: "I feel like sometimes it if ain't broke, don't fix it. And what has always made "The Challenge" so incredible is its simplicity. You don't need all of the bells and whistles and gimmicks."

Bananas used cold hard stats to back up his argument, adding, "Listen, the fans know what they like. I think it's very apparent in just how the ratings are now that it's like they are trying to force feed them something that they don't want." Proving that he's lost none of his showbiz tendencies since taking a break from the franchise, the Californian then referred to himself in the third person: "You can't just take out a Johnny Bananas and plug in a whoever and have fans be like, 'OK, that's a fair swap!'"

Johnny Bananas has been a regular on our screens since the 2006 season of "The Real World." But that doesn't mean he necessarily wants his private life plastered all over the tabloids. Indeed, while ex-girlfriend Morgan Willett relished spilling the tea about their split in 2021, "The Challenge" star largely kept schtum.

Shortly after the break-up, Bananas told E! News that while he's a public figure who is no stranger to being at the center of speculation, headlines, and drama, the typically verbose MTV star wanted to keep a lid on this particular situation. "I think we're both really going through it right now and I wish her all the best and I'll just leave it at that," he said. 

Bananas did just leave it at that for several months. But during an episode of his "Death, Taxes and Bananas" podcast in January 2022, he was keen to point out his public silence didn't mean he'd moved on right away, nor did it mean he was not hurting. The reality television veteran added, "If it were up to me, I would have chosen obviously to keep all the salacious details private because once things did go public, all the sharks out there smelled blood in the water. They tore us both to pieces, I felt somewhat fairly and unfairly, and it really tarnished and overshadowed some of the beautiful aspects of the time that we had spent together."

You won't be surprised to learn that Johnny Bananas isn't "The Challenge" regular's real name. Born John Amadeus Devenanzio in Fullerton, California, in 1982, the reality TV star acquired his more familiar moniker when he was a student at Penn State University. So what exactly did he do to warrant such a crazy reputation?

Well, it actually all sounds pretty tame. Per USA Today, when he appeared on "The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon" in 2017, Bananas explained that his nomme de tube was inspired by the "banana in the tailpipe" skate trick from Eddie Murphy flick "Beverly Hills Cop." The name subsequently stuck and undoubtedly helped him to attract attention on his screen debut in the 2006 season of "The Real World."

The "1st Look" host hasn't missed the opportunity to capitalize on his adopted surname, either. You can buy various items of clothing, including a face mask, branded with bananas on Johnny's official website.

In 2003, Michael Mizanin made the unlikely move from reality TV to professional wrestling when he signed up to the WWE as The Miz: he'd made his name on "The Real World: Back in New York" five years earlier before competing in several seasons of "The Challenge." And this career reinvention appears to have given another staple of the MTV franchise some ideas.

Speaking to ScreenRant in 2021, Johnny Bananas revealed that he also has hopes of entering the wrestling in the future, and that he has one particular opponent in mind: The Miz. Bananas went on to claim that his experience as a heel during his 20 seasons on "The Challenge" has laid the groundwork for a stint in the world of chinlocks and clawholds. What's more, he appreciates how The Miz paved the way for all other reality TV graduates: "What he's been able to do with the MTV 'Challenge' and 'Real World' platform, parlaying it into what he has as an actor, as a host, and as a WWE superstar? That guy is pretty much the blueprint of exactly the steps I'd like to follow and the trail I'd like to blaze for myself."

And hey, they'd make a heck of a tag team. As Mizanin said on an episode of "1st Look" where the two volunteered at an animal sanctuary, "I guess you could say The Miz and Bananas is like two egotistical, arrogant villains coming together for a good cause."

In 2020, Johnny Bananas won "The Challenge" for the seventh time in the series dubbed "Total Madness." And the reality star certainly made sure that everyone knew he suffered for his success. In fact, during an interview with E! News, Bananas claimed that he'd had it much worse than anyone stuck in quarantine.

To be fair, the MTV regular and his cast mates spent all of their downtime in a less-than-cozy underground bunker in Prague (regular viewers know that "The Challenge" houses are usually well-appointed mansions with sparkling swimming pools), and they didn't interact with, let alone see anyone who wasn't a part of the show. When the "Total Madness" cast first laid eyes on the season's especially austere accommodations, they were unsurprisingly thrown off. "For the first time ever, we're living in a nuclear bomb shelter," Bananas told viewers. "This place is terrifying."

In the aforementioned E! News interview, Bananas recalled, "There was nothing even close to what this one did to your psyche. I consider myself a very mentally tough person on 'The Challenge' and I've basically done it all. I feel like I've pushed my mind to limits I didn't even know possible and this one was in a whole different realm. This one broke everyone ... it was hell." 

Johnny Bananas wouldn't necessarily seem like the most obvious candidate to take over the late Anthony Bourdain's king of food travelogue title. But that's what the oft-dastardly reality TV star has set his sights on, as he revealed in a 2019 chat with Rolling Stone.

At the time, Bananas was a year into his stint as host of "1^st Look," the NBC show in which he journeyed across the country to highlight some of its hottest restaurants. And "The Challenge" regular took a lot of inspiration from the man who'd mastered such a format: "I found myself watching all of his old episodes. I want to see what made that guy so successful and that's who I'm trying to emulate. That's really what I want to do, whether it's traveling or hosting something in a studio. I want to take that next step."

So we know that Bananas can talk about food, but can he actually cook it like his TV hero, too? Well, in an interview with Muscle and Fitness, he said that he enjoys nothing more than attempting to replicate his favorite restaurant meals at home, with sweet potato tortillas a particular speciality.

The daddy of the reality TV genre, "The Real World" was a must-watch for anyone who grew up in the '90s and early '00s. Although, as it turns out, not for one of its most famous graduates. Deprived of cable television as a youngster, Johnny Bananas hadn't watched until he was at Penn State University. Speaking to Rolling Stone in 2019, Bananas explained that he was only introduced to the show by a girlfriend obsessed with its depiction of young adult life.

And he sure liked what he saw. He shared, "I was like, 'Let me get this straight: This is basically about guys who live in a house with hot girls and they party and they argue and they get a little bit of notoriety for that? I can do that.'" Bananas subsequently made an audition tape for the MTV hit, sent it off, and within months he was part of the 2006 season's Florida-based cast.

With that, Bananas became a fixture of the small screen, and his work on "Real World" spin-off "The Challenge" alone has been lucrative: Per Entertainment Weekly, he's won nearly $1.9 million on the competition. There's some debate about what his net worth is, but according to Celebrity Net Worth, it reportedly sits at $200,000.