Travis Kelce Hosts ‘Are You Smarter Than a Celebrity?’: Excited to follow in the footsteps of many TV icons
Travis Kelce’s game-changing year continues.
The NFL star, who helped lead his Kansas City Chiefs to a Super Bowl championship over San Francisco in February, will now host the game show “Are You Smarter Than a Celebrity?” For Prime Video.
Oh, and his relationship with the biggest pop star in the world, Taylor Swift, is still hot and heavy.
Not too shabby.
While news surfaced earlier this year that Kelsey was in talks to host Are You Smarter Than a Celebrity?, it’s now official, according to Deadline. There is no premiere date yet.
This won’t be Kelce’s first TV gig; He starred in the reality dating show “Catching Kelse” (2016) for USA Network and signed with CAA last spring with an eye toward more television work.
Kelsey was reportedly in talks to host a “major new music competition series” for a network but the deal never came to fruition.
His deal with Prime Video is to host 20 episodes of “Are You Smarter Than a Celebrity?”, a reboot of the old PKB series “Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader?”, hosted by Jeff PKBworthy, which has aired since 2007 -2009 and again in 2015. [John Cena hosted a version of that show on Nickelodeon in 2019.]
According to Deadline, each episode of the show will feature a celebrity-filled cla*sroom helping the adult contestant answer 11 questions on various topics pulled from an elementary school curriculum for the grand prize of $100,000.
Each contestant asks the celebrities for help and can also “trick” them if necessary. In the final $100,000 question – always at the sixth grade level – the contestant chooses a celebrity to discuss the answer before “locking in” their final answer.
The showrunner will be Wes Kauble, creator of Beat Shazam, who will also serve as an executive producer alongside Mark Burnett, according to Deadline.
“I grew up loving game shows, and I’m excited to follow in the footsteps of so many TV icons by hosting my first show with ‘Are You Smarter Than a Celebrity?'” Kelsey said in a statement. “The original show was a huge hit, so bringing a new format with everyone’s favorite celebrities on screen will definitely be a treat.
“I’m very happy to be on the host side of the equation here and excited to see how these famous faces keep up.”
Kelce’s footprint in entertainment continues to grow.
He’s producing a documentary called “King Pleasure” about artist Jean-Michel Basquiat, and recently launched his own music festival called Kelce Jam, according to The Hollywood Reporter. It will take place on April 28 in Kansas City with superstars Machine Gun Kelly and Ross.
Kelce also co-hosts the sports podcast “New Heights.”