Comedy Game Show Guy Montgomery’s Guy Mont-Spelling Bee Should Be on Everyone’s Lips

Somewhere in a TV studio in Auckland, New Zealand, there’s a chance that Guy Montgomery is holding his comedy friends and peers hostage and making them spell for him. Guy Montgomery’s Guy Mont Spelling Bee, a purposefully “hokey” and dubiously punny title, grew from informal spelling bees the dry, alternative Kiwi comedian remotely hosted on Zoom and YouTube during the COVID lockdowns featuring his pool of comedian pals, making them vulnerably display their shaky spelling acumen and get way too competitive. If you ever thought theatersports could use a lot less theater, a lot more Kiwi comedy, and a healthy dose of triggering childhood insecurities, this is the show for you.

Montgomery’s eight-episode debut season of his game show, which aired on the New Zealand channel Three last year, was developed alongside comedian Joseph Moore off the back of in-person spelling bees held during the Melbourne International Comedy Festival in 2022, where stand-up-starved audiences could enjoy their favorite fest acts try to be funny and take spelling seriously at the same time, all while their good friend Guy, who held all the cards and risked no humiliation in front of an audience, threw them high-concept, impossibly-tough spelling bee curveballs and put them on the spot whenever possible. As Montgomery points out on the minimalist, brownish set—which purposely features few digital screens or eye-catching set design to stress the charming limits of broadcast TV game shows—Guy Mont Spelling Bee is funded by New Zealand taxpayers, which makes the game show’s very personally realized alternative vibe all the more hilarious.

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When the TV game show version premiered (Season 2 airs on Three from September 5), Montgomery was in full command of his hosting persona—a Machiavellian puppetmaster wearing the skin and ill-fitting suit of a cheery game show host. He is dry, off-kilter, but basically always smiling, happy to snap back at a “country of origin” or “definition” request with a silly one-liner, and talking in a booming, measured cadence that only slips when he’s mocking his contestants or laughing at how absurd this set-up is. Along for the ride is a deadpan co-host, which feels like a riff on the unassuming Taskmaster assistant position’; in Season 1, the role is filled by Sanjay Patel, and in Season 2 it’s Aaron Chen.

This host is responsible for the difficult and frankly irresponsible spelling rounds faced by the hapless contestants—which include “Homophones,” where they are given a word with two spellings and hope they picked the right one (a possible 30 Rock reference); “Household Adjectives,” where they pick a domestic prop and spell an adjective Montgomery has picked to described it; and “Flags,” where contestants are shown a flag and asked to spell the country it represents with no confirmation of what the country actually is.

This lack of certainty enhances the inherent anxiety of taking part in a spelling bee, often driving contestants towards confusion, frustration, and delirious answers, like when Hayley Sproull connects a flag that reminds her of Greece with a (uncited) piece of trivia about halloumi coming from the region “Halloumi.” “That is not how you spell Uruguay,” Montgomery bluntly tells her after she has spelled out the brined cheese.

Four different comics take the podium each episode, with the winner of each tournament progressing to the next one and the loser ending the episode sitting with a dunce cap on their head. Season 1 guests have included New Zealand superstar Urzila Carlson, Taskmaster NZ assistant Paul Williams and his presenter brother Guy, and Montgomery’s long-standing podcast co-host Tim Batt. The closeness between Montgomery and guests like Batt only embolden the charged power dynamics coursing through the show; after surprising his friend by only making him spell “big,” you can see the thin film of trust between contestant and host, as if genuine psychological unrest has occurred (Montgomery, as a consequence, refuses to make eye contact with him). Like many comedy game shows, everyone is performing up to a point, and seeing the bareboned frustration lying beneath the contestants’ jokes proves again and again a rewarding formula for hilarity.

Each 44 minute long episode keeps things interesting with heightened centerpiece spelling rounds that often involve innocent bystanders—the most memorable of which involves four 13-year-olds paired up with each contestant, where the comedian risks losing a cool prize specially picked for the child if they spell a word wrong. It’s a wild card presence for the contestant to bounce off, while also raising the tangible fear of pressure and disappointment. Montgomery makes sure to follow the comedic rule of escalation during rounds, meaning the contestant who goes third or fourth often has to face a tougher word to spell than those who went first or second—an indignity worsened by the fact that their host may have chosen that round to wear a cheap animal mask.

It all contributes to what makes Guy Mont Spelling Bee so irresistible—a willingness to be petty, mean-spirited, and completely unfair, all balanced by the near-constant acknowledgments of how silly the high-stakes retro schoolkid contest is. An Australian version of the show will soon be on the airwaves—soon, every nation should have their own Guy Montgomery’s Guy Mont Spelling Bee, in every language, with every variety of anxiety-inducing words to spell.

Rory Doherty is a screenwriter, playwright and culture writer based in Edinburgh, Scotland. You can follow his thoughts about all things stories @roryhasopinions.