Last year, Trevor St. Agathe showed his face on The Circle. Only the person behind the face wasn’t him, but his wife DeLeesa, who played the catfish game perfectly to win the top spot. Two seasons later, it was time for the man himself to give it a try. Trevor entered halfway through the game, catfishing as his wife’s friend Imani. And he made up for lost time, forming bonds quickly while also exploiting suspicions about the other players. As a result, he was able to make it to the finale, where everyone was shocked to see he was not only a catfish, but someone who had his own history on the show. Unfortunately for Trevor, he finished one spot shy of his wife’s placement. Still, his second-place finish cemented the St. Agathe family as a dominant force in The Circle. Read on to hear Trevor and DeLeesa’s thoughts on Trevor’s time in the game. And check out Parade.com throughout The Circle season 4 with the various players and catfishes alike. So Trevor, what’s the series of events that got you from having your picture show up in season 2 to actually playing in season 4?Trevor St. Agathe: As DeLeesa’s season was airing, more people started to ask her, “Hey, it’d be funny to see Trevor on the show. How do you think he would do?” And I started thinking about it. And I was like, “I would do fantastic on the show!” There’s no way the competitor in me would not let me be successful on the show. And then people always ask me to critique DeLeesa’s game. And I would say, “I probably wouldn’t have said that. I probably wouldn’t have done that.” And she’s like, “Well, do you think you could do better?” So then I’m like, “Yes!” We’re competitive amongst each other. So when she said that, my antennas went off. I was like, “You know what? I want to try.” So then, I just went through all the steps that everybody else went through. Applying, auditioning, interviewing, etc. And fortunately enough for me, I was able to get on and showcase what I could do. DeLeesa, what was your reaction to finding out that Trevor was actually going to put his money where his mouth is and play the game you won?DeLeesa St. Agathe: Like Trevor said, we’re so competitive. So I’m just like, “Oh, you are definitely not going to do better than me. But when the time came, and he got the call, I got really excited as well. I support my husband 100%. He always supports me. So even though we have our silent competition, I’m just like, “I actually want you to do better than me, because we want more money!” (Laughs.)Trevor: It’s tough to be bested by her in anything. So in the back of my mind, I’m like, “She’s gonna hold this over my head for the rest of my life if I don’t win.“DeLeesa: I’m glad I was your encouragement!Trevor: You were! That’s heavy to walk back through the door with nothing. (Laughs.) But it was so cool. And it’s really nice knowing that I had so much support from her. Like she said, even though we have our competition, I knew she was really rooting for me. It’s those kinds of those things you need to really get through and enjoy the experience. So DeLeesa, in the spirit of that competition, did you give Trevor any advice before he went onto the show?DeLeesa:Of course! Obviously, he went in as a catfish. He couldn’t go in as himself. And because I went in as him as a male, I thought he should go in as a female, and he definitely agreed. I felt, as a woman, it was my duty to give him all the necessary tips and tricks of how to be a woman, all that backhand information that he would never know. Because he helped me, it’s only right I help him out with that. With the game, it was impossible for me to give him any tips on that because I don’t know the players. I don’t know how the game is going to go. I don’t know the little games that they’re going to have. There was no way for me to help him in any other capacity. How did you settle on Imani as the profile you would catfish as?Trevor: So that was part of our arrangement. DeLeesa got to choose who I went as in the game. I personally do not know Imani. I’ve never met her, never had a conversation. If I walk down the street, we’d probably walk right past each other. I might not even recognize her. So I just added a whole new persona to her. You end up being part of the last group of players to enter The Circle. How did that change any strategy you had prepared?Trevor: It absolutely changed everything for me. You just constantly compare how DeLeesa did things, or how the game actually went for DeLeesa. And I was like, “Whoa, this is completely different from me.” So I told myself, when I went in, I was just going to have to be a lot more adaptable, based on the information that I got and the way the game was going. I just have to be whatever the game needs me to be right now, whatever people need me to be, in order to get a little bit of influence. I felt like everybody really knew how things were going, and the game was moving so fast. I just needed to be able to jump in and hit the ground running. I could apply certain things from my original strategy, but not everything. You entered the game alongside Eversen, who ends up becoming an important person for you, as well as a flirting partner. Talk to me about your relationship.Trevor: I felt like we had so much in common. We’re the exact same age. If this were somebody that I met outside, we’d probably be friends. So I could understand to a certain extent how a man like that thinks. And then I felt like the fact that we came in together gave us something to bond over. So I thought, “This would be a really good ally for Imani in this game.” And who wouldn’t want to flirt? (Laughs.) Once I saw his personality, I was like, “This is going to be really fun. I think we can have a lot of really good conversations.” So that’s how I decided to just, for lack of a better word, target him as an ally. DeLeesa, what was your reaction when Trevor came home and said that he flirted in the game?DeLeesa: It’s hilarious to me. (Laughs.) I loved seeing all the ins and outs of his flirtatious game. I’m a big flirt. So I hope I taught him well over the years. Trevor, you also connected quickly with Frank, choosing to save him with the antivirus software. What made you form a bond with him?Trevor: It was really the personality you felt coming through that screen. Frank is so much energy and light and positivity. I felt this was somebody Imani could have a really good relationship with; even myself outside of the game could have a really good relationship with. He just seems like such a really good person. Even from that first chat that we had my first day in, I was like, “I like this guy already. He likes brunch. We love brunch. Yes, I want to go get a mimosa with you!” (Laughs.) Everybody gave a really good vibe, but something about him really jumped out at me. Frank was just he was just unbelievable personality from the get-go. How about Rachel? It seems like you two form a close connection, and part of your reason for rating her so high is because of the “sisterhood” she built with Imani.Trevor: With Rachel, at first, I was like, “Okay, I don’t know how much we’re going to have in common, how much we’ll be able to vibe.” We hadn’t had a conversation. I had just seen the profile that morning. So I was like, “Okay, well, let’s see how this goes. But when she spoke, I appreciated the fact that she was so blunt. It caught me off guard. But I was like, “You know what? A person who is going to say whatever’s on their mind, and the fact that she survived in the game that long being honest, is something I appreciate. I actually wouldn’t mind having somebody like that on my side.” My strategy was always to form a connection with the females in the game. I didn’t want to be at odds with any women because you just never really know, especially coming into the game late. When I came in, I didn’t really know any relationships. So it’d be really unwise to start ruffling any feathers. But with Rachel, but the fact that she was so blunt, I was like, “You know what? I really want to have this person as an ally because I feel like I could depend on her.” On the other side of that, you were super wary of Nathan, AKA Alex, accusing him of being a catfish via an anonymous painting. As a catfish yourself, how did you react to other catfish in the game?Trevor: The name of the game is survival. To stay in to the end, somebody’s got to go. And if you find a hole in somebody’s game, you’ve got to exploit it. That’s not my fault. If you’ve got a weakness, that’s your fault. And I found it very early. And like you said, I was dead set on it. I was like, “There’s nothing that’s gonna change my mind.” I took it, and I ran with it. And when I got my opportunity, I was like, “Here it is, I’m just going to put it out there.” And even if it just casts a little bit of doubt in people’s minds, and gets people to start to look back and think back on conversations they had with him, and they’re like, “That could be true.” I felt like I had the advantage because there wasn’t so much known about me yet. So I felt I just needed to take this opportunity to just throw a little bit of put a little doubt in people’s minds as to who Nathan is, because I felt very strongly that he wasn’t who he said he was. I just needed to be able to continue in this game. Somebody’s gotta go. And I don’t want it to be me. Nathan, it’s going to be you.DeLeesa: If you just bring it back to my season, I think it proves it sucks to be a catfish. You don’t want people to come after you because you’re a catfish. But at the same time, if you put a little doubt in people’s minds on somebody else, it kind of takes the heat off of you. Like that whole Jack situation from my season with the makeup. We both could have been targeted. But because he was just a little bit worse than mine, he took all that attention. So I feel like that was just a super smart move on his part. You took that from my book. (Laughs.) This season, it seemed like some people were more forgiving of keeping known catfish in the game if it helped their own relationships. DeLeesa, as someone who played as a catfish, do you think there’s an evolution in the way people are playing with catfish?DeLeesa: Absolutely. When you look back at the first season, they didn’t really know how to play the game. So they come in and say, “Hey, I’m cool with everybody. Like, how does this work? We’re all trying to figure it out.” In season two, we came in guns blazing. We still didn’t really know much about the game, but we had our game plan, and we tried to stick to it as much as possible. And then it just keeps going from there. I think that’s what makes the show so great. People come in, and they have their strategies, and they’re working towards this end goal. And they’re doing whatever they’re going to do whatever it takes to get it. And I think that’s just so much fun just to watch how everybody plays the game differently. Trevor, what were your final ratings of the other four finalists.Trevor: Frank was one. Eversen was two. Rachel was three. And Yu Ling was four. What was your rationale behind your choices?Trevor: I struggled quite a bit. Because it’s a lot of pressure at that point in the game, and you want to make the right decision. I honestly felt in my heart that was the best order. I remember I’d lost so much sleep over it the night before because I knew I was going to have a really tough decision to make the next day. So I went with who I vibe with the most in that game. I found it to be the best arrangement. Everyone at that final table was shocked to see who you really were, especially people who were fans of The Circle. Did you expect that reaction?Trevor: Not from everybody. I’m not naive enough to say that I fooled everyone. I was like, “Somebody has to be on to me.” You definitely feel validated. But I thought at least one person thought something was not right. But when I saw those reactions, I was like, “Yes! I actually came in here and did it.” So that was 100% validated for me. You ended up finishing second. On the one hand, it’s a great finish for someone who came in halfway through. On the other hand, I know you’re super competitive. What was your reaction?Trevor: What’s crazy is, at the moment, you’re just so excited to be there. I was like, “Wow, I’m sitting there. I’m looking down this couch. I can’t believe I’m here.” Because I think back to my wife being on this couch. I’m at least in the conversation to win this game. That in itself is an accomplishment considering when I came in, because it’s scary coming in late in the game. When it was down to Frank and myself, I’m like, “It’d be really amazing to see Imani’s face turn around.” But I think I was more excited for Frank’s win than anybody else in that room. At that moment, it was very much like, “This man deserves to win this game.” And I was very happy for him. There was no point in time where I was like, “Oh man, gosh. It would have been really nice. Frank shouldn’t have won. I should have won.” It wasn’t anything like that. I was very happy to make it that far. I’m happy with my performance. And I’m really happy that Frank walked away with the win. DeLeesa, what was your reaction to when he came home and told you that you still are the highest finisher in the family by one spot?DeLeesa: So I’m going to go back to the supportive wife role. (Laughs.) When he explained it, I was very proud of him. I have to be funny and silly. And I’m like, “I still hold the crown in the family.” But I’m very proud of the decision that he made. I’m very proud that, in the end, it still was a game of his heart as opposed to just all strategy. For me, that’s the man that I know. That’s the man that I love. He plays with integrity. That’s who he is. I’m proud of him, no matter how he did. It’s hard to even get on the show, and he came in late to the game and made it to the end. I’m beyond proud of him. But, I mean, I still hold the crown. (Laughs.) Would the two of you ever entertain the idea of playing in The Circle together as one profile?Trevor: If I have a chance to go on with my wife, I take it 100%. Think about it. You and I finished one and two. We’re arguably two of the best catfish to play.DeLeesa: Yeah, I think we’d do amazing.Trevor: We’d light it up!DeLeesa: He’s really, really smart, and he’s actually strategic as well. I’m very obviously very strategic. I think we would kill it, honestly. I think there will be like no chance whatsoever for anybody to win. (Laughs.) Next, check out our interview with The Circle Season 4 winner Frank Grimsley.
