An ABC TV quiz show recently descended into chaos when an overenthusiastic audience member spoiled the episode during a live taping.
During an episode of Guy Montgomery’s Guy Mont-Spelling Bee, a contestant surprised the New Zealand comedian and host with an unexpected lifeline provided by the audience.
Fellow comedian He Huang was struggling to identify (and then spell) the name of a country represented by one of four international flags.
The contestant, after receiving the ‘fun fact’ prompt that hinted, ‘This country has a lot of world’s heaviest animals because a lot of them are still carrying the psychological weight of World War Two,’ turned to Guy and asked, ‘Does it start with G?’
‘Poland!’ a voice from the crowd yelled out, shocking everyone on the stage.
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Fellow contestants Emma Holland and Rove McManus were left visibly shocked, with Emma covering her mouth with one hand to stifle a genuine gasp and Rove freezing with his jaw open.
‘That is absolutely illegal,’ a stunned Guy reprimanded the audience member, prompting a round of raucous laughter.
Co-host Aaron Chen sprung into action.
‘Don’t worry Guy, I’ll go sort this,’ he yelled, before pretending to run into the audience to apprehend the audience member.
Not to be outdone, Rove made eye contact with the audience as he said, ‘Before I go, can I just check, are any of my “ancestors” out there?’
‘That is generally discouraged,’ Guy responded.
The host was adamant that the real-life blooper not be taken out of the episode in the final edit because he enjoyed how ‘incredibly unusual’ and ‘kind of funny’ the moment was.
Speaking to news.com.au, Guy said he felt the social contract between a live audience and TV quiz show contestants was ‘pretty clear’.
Which is, of course, not to participate in the game show unless you’re actually a contestant.
‘To be fair, no one was requesting spelling assistance,’ Guy laughed.
‘The show does draw an audience of word nerds or people who believe in themselves as spellers, so there is a sense of excitement and frustration that can occur when they’re watching a contestant who is so close to approaching a word.’
The stand-up comic and TV host attempted to unpack potential underlying motivations that may have pushed the helpful heckler to break that unspoken contract.
‘One might be sympathy and that you’re wanting to help them. You think “I can get them over the line here”,’ he theorised.
Guy came up with the idea for The Guy Mont Spelling Bee in 2020 during the Covid lockdown in Auckland.
He invited some of his comedian friends to join him on a Zoom for the silly spelling contest and uploaded the results to YouTube, creating an informal pilot for a stage show.
Joseph Moore came onboard as a co-writer and pitched the idea to ABC, with Aaron Chen attached as a co-host.
Guy has previously said the series has developed ‘quite an intense fandom,’ thanks its rotating roster of top Aussie and Kiwi comedians.
Previous guests have included the likes of Melanie Bracewell, Urzila Carlson, Geraldine Hickey, Nazeem Hussain, Demi Lardner, Zoë Coombs Marr, Luke McGregor, Tim Minchin, Rhys Nicholson and Steph Tisdell.
