On the eve of ABC hit show Guy Montgomery’s Guy Mont Spelling Bee returning for a third season, its host is musing on any changes or new games that viewers could expect.
“What’s unique in this interview is I don’t think we’ve ever discussed the new games prior to them being done in the record,” Montgomery says. “I would hate for the contestants to read it and then show up and know what’s going to happen.”
Comedian Sam Campbell, who is taking over from Aaron Chen as Montgomery’s assistant, has an idea.
“Maybe we could throw out some dummy sort of ideas?” he says.
Montgomery (laughing): “Yes.”
Campbell: “Skarsgardian Angel. That hasn’t made it in, which is just a damn shame.”
Skarsgardian Angel?
“This is me hovering as a beautiful angel above a tree,” Campbell says. “It’s got all of the Skarsgard family on it. You know the Skarsgard family? I think there’s at least 50 of them.”
Other ideas?
“There’s a game where everyone’s on hoverboards,” Campbell says. “Anyone doing this show should be practising that mode of transport.”
Anything from Montgomery?
“I’m just trying to think,” he says. “I put a lot of energy into the ones that we finished. There’s one where Sam takes on a side hustle as a valet working at the ABC, and in between contestants, he has to run out and park cars of different high-powered ABC figures. Then he’ll bring something back from the glove box and the contestants have to spell that.”
Be assured Spelling Bee mostly follows its successful original format. Comedians attempt to spell words; Montgomery hosts, now with sidekick Campbell; the set retains its glorious orange, brown and cream hues; and the Coward’s Cup, the Person’s Purse and the Bucket of Bravery return, along with the dunce’s hat and novelty sized “one-way ticket” prize.
But how does Campbell see his new role?
Montgomery: “I’ve been meaning to ask him this myself.”
Campbell: “Aaron got out of the bath, and he left the water in. I’m bringing my own essential oils that I’m hoping to add. He created this broth, and I’m just getting in there. Really, my only goal is to keep Guy safe. I’ve been watching a lot of Wallace and Gromit. Wallace’s sidekick, Gromit, he’s always looking after him because there are nefarious people who don’t have his best intentions. Guy Montgomery, he’s so well meaning. He looks like a matinee idol. But he can be fooled.”
What is Montgomery’s focus going into series three?
“I’m just hoping Sam doesn’t bring up Wallace and Gromit every episode,” he says. “No, I’m excited to be back. I haven’t been performing really at all. We put so much effort into it. The show is so ornate and stuffed, and there’s so many people who work so hard to create the infrastructure of it. I’m excited to be back.”
One change is comedians Abby Howells and Emma Holland joining as show co-writers after Joseph Moore, Montgomery’s longtime co-writer and co-executive producer, began working on Saturday Night Live UK.
In joining a Logie winner (Montgomery won most popular new talent in 2025), and assuming the role of a Logie winner (Chen won for Fisk in 2025), is Campbell crossing his fingers for the biggest prize in Australian TV awards?
“Oh, no, no, no, no, absolutely not,” he says. “Oh, no. Someone as humble as I. Oh, no, no, no.”
Montgomery: “All right, Uriah Heep.”
Campbell (digging into Charles Dickens’ fawning character): “Oh, mother and I couldn’t possibly. Oh, no. But, if you wanted me to? Oh, of course, I would attend the Logies event. Of course.”
How does he really feel about filling Chen’s shoes?
“He’s left a beautiful legacy but these days I guess he’s just much more interested in Scientology,” he says. “Aaron loves L. Ron.”
Montgomery, keeping things mildly sensible, reflects on Spelling Bee’s enormous all-ages appeal.
“It was not designed specifically with intergenerational viewing in mind,” he says. “But what has been incredibly heartening is the age range of people who approach me or say, ‘I love this show and I watch it with my kids or my grandkids or my pet. It’s really crazy because [the show] is so stupid.”
Campbell interrupts. “We’ve done ultrasounds and the scans are showing they’re into the Bee,” he says.
Montgomery continues.
“The way that it’s been taken on as a family show, while not compromising the sensibility or what we can joke about, has become kind of a guiding principle,” he says. “You can push things a little bit, fight your own editorial lines, but you want to be mindful that people are watching this with their kids. And you do want them to be able to enjoy it.”
Are contestants still more keen on Bucket of Bravery words than easier ones?
“Yes,” Montgomery says. “I do try to encourage people to choose from a wide variety of receptacles. One, because of their spelling ability, and two, because of the volume of jokes we write for the show and the rate at which they get burnt if people only go for the Bucket of Bravery.
“They’re the hardest words to write jokes for. The main reason I want people to go for different receptacles is because it means that by the end of the production week, we’re not sitting in a writer’s room the morning of a record of two shows trying to think of 10 jokes for three difficult words.”
Does Montgomery carry a love for dictionaries?
“I love language,” he says.
Campbell: “I like Macquarie Bank.”
Montgomery: “Yeah, they’re a different Macquarie.”
Campbell: “That’s not the same Macquarie?”
In comedy and everyday conversation, Montgomery savours word selection, including ones slightly wrong on purpose or needlessly lengthy.
“That is something I got from my dad,” he says, also attributing this to satirist John Clarke’s comedy. “I watched Lorin Clarke’s documentary about her dad recently. I knew he had an influence across the performing part of New Zealand comedy, but I didn’t quite realise how deeply embedded his influence over our entire sensibility is.”
He and Campbell reiterate their excitement about Spelling Bee’s future.
Montgomery: “On an immediate, personal and professional level, I’m just so happy to be back, to have found and made something which people seem to enjoy and to have free rein to make it how we want to, is a dream come true.”
Campbell: “To be honest, they have shot down a lot of my ideas, Lenny. I wanted to change the name of the show to Spellraisers, with Guy and I going around on motorbikes making people spell words. If they get it wrong, we make them drink a bottle of Smirnoff Ice. But really, Guy is the safest pair of hands there really is.”
Guy Montgomery’s Guy Mont Spelling Bee screens at 8.30pm on Wednesdays at 8:30pm and on ABC iview.
