# Guy Montgomery's Guy Mont-Spelling Bee (Australian TV series)

Guy Montgomery's Guy Mont-Spelling Bee is an Australian television comedy panel show on the ABC, created and presented by Guy Montgomery and co-hosted by Aaron Chen, based on the New Zealand TV show of the same name. The eight-episode first series premiered on 14 August 2024; every episode was made available on ABC iview that day.
Guy Mont-Spelling Bee is loosely based on a spelling bee: each episode, four comedians participate in a series of rounds, where the goal is almost always to spell words or names in rounds that are "designed to befuddle, bamboozle, and bedazzle". The winner of each episode competes again the following episode and the loser of each episode must wear a dunce cap in the Dunce's Corner.
The show has been renewed for a second season, to air in 2025.

## Production

Guy Mont-Spelling Bee is co-produced by Kevin & Co. and ABC Television. This is the second Kevin & Co. production outside New Zealand, having earlier been involved in the production of Taskmaster Australia.
The first series was filmed from 26–29 June 2024 at the ABC Ultimo Centre. The cast includes Wil Anderson, Tony Armstrong, Concetta Caristo, Urzila Carlson (who also appeared in the original New Zealand version), Tom Gleeson, Peter Helliar, Geraldine Hickey, Nazeem Hussain, Demi Lardner, Zoë Coombs Marr, Luke McGregor, Tim Minchin, Rhys Nicholson and Steph Tisdell.

## Format

Each episode begins with the four contestants being introduced (with the returning champion playing on the rightmost podium) before participating in The Spelling Round and ends with The Buzz Round. In between those rounds, three other rounds and a mini-game are played with Aaron Chen acting as an assistant in these rounds.

### The Spelling Round

Guests pick a word from the Coward's Cup (easy to spell words worth one point), the Person's Purse (worth two points), or the Bucket of Bravery (words deemed challenging to spell and worth three points). The guest receives the points if their spelling is correct.

### Original rounds

* Aaron'd the World: Aaron spins a model globe and points at a country randomly. The guest must then spell a word relating to the country picked out.
* A Decent Proposal: Guests are put into pairs. Each guest is assigned one easy word and one near impossible word to have their partner spell. If both guests spell correctly, two points are assigned to each guest. If only one guest in the pair spells correctly, they get four points. If neither guest spells correctly, no one earns any points. (Similar to the Prisoner's Dilemma)
* Battle of the Codes: Each guest is paired with an athlete. Each pair is given a word relating to their football code. The duo can then talk about the difficulty of spelling the word but not how to spell. The nominated speller will then attempt to spell the word. Correct spellers bring their duos to the next round. Duos with an incorrect speller are then "benched", eliminated from the round and are given a brief "post game interview" with Chen.
* Can You Spell What Aaron is Cooking?: Aaron gives each guest a cooking demonstration (including ingredients and steps). Guests must then spell the dish being made.
* Do the D.A.N.C.E.: Dancers perform a dance routine in the studio in front of the guest. The guest must then successfully identify and spell the dance's name for two full points. The guest can decide to ask for the dance's name, but they must spell its name while performing the routine (granting one point).
* Drinks: Guest must spell their chosen drink.
* Girt by C: Each guest must select an Australian water formation for Aaron to drink a sample of. The guest must successfully spell a certain word that was used or is related to Aaron's tasting notes of the water. Each word in this round begins and ends with the letter C.
* Hometown Hero: Guests spell a word that relates to the area they came from.
** In episode 1, since Carlson was born in South Africa, a map of that country was also depicted in addition to the map of Australia.
* Horsing: A Round: Each guest has a horse assigned to them in a "horse race." Guests spell horse-related words to allow their horse to advance; otherwise, their horse remains stationary. Guests may also gamble on any horse to win the race (to a maximum of five points at 2/1 odds).
* Impressions: Each guest will be given an image of a famous celebrity or public figure. The guest must then spell the celebrity's name while giving an (accurate) impression of said celebrity. One point is awarded for the spelling; another point is awarded for the impression.
* Money: Guests pick a denomination of Australian currency, which includes currently circulating coins and banknotes, to spell a word related to their chosen denomination.
* Spell the Crew Member's Name: Guests must identify and spell the correct full name of a crew member of the show.
* Spell the Crime, Do the Time: Guests are given words related to crime that must be spelled correctly. Incorrect spellers are then kept in a replica prison cell guarded by Aaron until the end of the round. The round ends when all guests are imprisoned.
* Spell the Disaster: The guest must spell the distress signal of a historic disaster.
* Spell the Ethnicity: Guests must spell out the ethnicity of a model.
* Spell Your Own Adventure: Each guest must pick a choose-your-own-adventure book. Each decision being made in the book must be spelled correctly. Your book ends when a word is spelled incorrectly or if the chosen path leads to a "perilous demise".
* The Hat Hat: Guests are given a "silly hat" to wear, which they must accurately spell. Guests with an incorrect spelling in this round must keep their hat on until they spell a word correctly.
* The Spelling Spell: Aaron pulls out a word from his magic hat. The guest can either spell this word or ask for a harder word for two points. Then, the guest can then spell the harder word or proceed to an even harder word for four points.
* Who Owns It?: Each guest must spell a word which, according to Guy, has its ownership be a source of conflict between the Australians and New Zealanders. One point is awarded for the correct spelling; another point is awarded for correctly identifying the rightful country of origin of the item being referred to.

### Adapted rounds

* Feelings: Guests must identify an item by touch and then spell it.
* Homophones: Guests must spell the correct word from homophones.
* Instruments: Guests hear a musical instrument and must spell it.
* Social Media: Montgomery confronts guests with past social media posts, and they must recreate or rectify typos, or spell a given related word.
* Spell it Better: Guests invent a new and improved spelling for an existing word chosen by Montgomery.
* Spell the Audience Name: Guests choose a member of the audience to spell their full (legal) name.
* Wingdings: Guests must translate a word displayed in Wingdings.

### The Buzz Round

The Buzz Round refers to the fast-paced round where words based on the chosen theme are spelled in a rapid-fire manner. The guest that is in last place, or chosen by Montgomery among those tied in last place, chooses one of four categories provided by Montgomery to start the round. Once the round starts, the guest who hits the buzzer first is given an opportunity to spell the word. Each word is worth one point, but the guest is docked one point if their spelling is incorrect.
The amount of time given in this round varies with each episode. The round ends once the voice of the spelling gods utters the words, "Stop spelling!"

### End of episode

At the end of each episode, the player with the highest score is declared the winner and is given a giant novelty ticket to appear in the next episode. In the event of a tie, a sudden-death word is given. Conversely, the guest (and in the event of a tied last place, guests) with the lowest score are gently applauded as they walk to the "Dunce's Corner" to wear a dunce cap.

## Episodes
### Season 1 (2024)

The first season premiered on 14 August 2024, with new episodes airing each Wednesday night. All eight episodes were released at once on ABC iview. The air dates shown in the table below are for ABC TV.
| No. in season | Guests | Original release date | Australian viewers (national) |
| 1 | Urzila Carlson, Nazeem Hussain, Danielle Walker, Tom Gleeson | 14 August 2024 (2024-8-14) | 659,000 |
| The Spelling Round; Money; Spell it Better; Hometown Hero; Spell the Audience Name; The Buzz Round (politics) ||||
| 2 | Geraldine Hickey, Peter Helliar, Urvi Majumdar, Nazeem Hussain | 21 August 2024 (2024-8-21) | 508,000 |
| The Spelling Round; The Hat Hat; Wingdings; Can You Spell What Aaron Is Cooking?; Homophones; The Buzz Round (sexy) ||||
| 3 | Cameron James, Jenny Tian, Tim Minchin, Nazeem Hussain | 28 August 2024 (2024-8-28) | 471,000 |
| The Spelling Round; Horsing: A Round; Spell the Crew Member's Name; Impressions; A Decent Proposal; The Buzz Round (zoo) ||||
| 4 | Wil Anderson, Steph Tisdell, Demi Lardner, Cameron James | 4 September 2024 (2024-9-4) | 419,000 |
| The Spelling Round; Spell the Crime, Do the Time; Drinks; Instruments; The Buzz Round (medieval) ||||
| 5 | Tom Ballard, Luke McGregor, Nikki Britton, Wil Anderson | 11 September 2024 (2024-9-11) | 477,000 |
| The Spelling Round; The Spelling Spell; Spell the Ethnicity; Spell Your Own Adventure; The Buzz Round (fashion) ||||
| 6 | Rhys Nicholson, Concetta Caristo, Dan Rath, Tom Ballard | 18 September 2024 (2024-9-18) | 425,000 |
| The Spelling Round; Aaron'd the World; Do the D.A.N.C.E.; Spell the Audience Name; The Buzz Round (biblical times) ||||
| 7 | Greg Larsen, Zoë Coombs Marr, Tony Armstrong, Tom Ballard | 25 September 2024 (2024-9-25) | 488,000 |
| The Spelling Round; Who Owns It?; Feelings; Battle of the Codes; The Buzz Round (office)Guest-starring Isaiah Papali'i, Nick Haynes, Alex Chidiac, and Tom Hooper ||||
| 8 | Michael Hing, Tom Walker, Alex Lee, Greg Larsen | 2 October 2024 (2024-10-2) | 445,000 |
| The Spelling Round; Girt by C; Spell the Disaster; A Decent Proposal; Social Media; The Buzz Round (books) ||||
    Winners in bold, dunces in italics.

## Reception

The premiere episode attracted an average overnight audience of 659,000 viewers nationally, winning the daily slot.
David Knox of TV Tonight gave the show three-and-a-half out of five stars. Critic Giselle Au-Nhien Nguyen of The Guardian gave it a positive review (five out of five stars), describing the show as "an absolute d-e-l-i-g-h-t".