Parents' Evening
Contents |
Host
Co-hosts
Shanthi Ranganathan
Broadcast
Ranga Bee Productions for ITV, 2 November 2024 to present
Synopsis
Three celebrities compete to win money for their chosen charity alongside their parents or children.
From left, Iain Stirling and mother, Carol Vorderman and son, Alison Hammond and son.
Parents bid in turn to say their child will be able to give more answers than the last person, or drop out of the round. Whichever child gets control steps up to the centre circle and tries to answer the question.
The winning bid sets the value for the round – £100 per correct answer. Suppose Alison Stirling's winning bid was five answers: the board will be worth £500. All to her team if Iain gives the answers, or split equally to the other sides if he gets it wrong.
Iain Stirling steps into the centre circle to play.
When playing, the child doesn't have to give solely correct answers, the child is allowed to make some mistakes. They do need to give a correct answer in a reasonable time, otherwise they'll "time out" and lose the grid. This feels rather arbitrary. Should anyone dare give an answer before their child plays, Romesh will pilfer £100 from the total, and that answer will be wrong.
Each parent gets to start one of these boards. Then there are a set of open questions. "Playable characters in Mario Kart", for instance. There's £200 per correct answer if the child completes the bid, but the money's again split between the others should they fail.
The competition show ends with a Quick Fire Buzzer Round. The parents are shown a question, and two alternatives they might answer. First person on the buzzer wins control of the question, and nominates A or B for their child to answer. Child is to answer the question correctly for £500; get it wrong, and £250 to the other two teams. It's quick and competitive, and with so much money flying around it's difficult for anyone to keep track. Also means that the first two-thirds of the show had very little impact on the result, which is not ideal.
Whichever team emerges with most money is the winner. They'll be able to donate that much cash to a charity of their choice, and they have the opportunity to double it. Parent and child play together for this round, a board of 12 possible answers appear. The winners want to identify all five correct answers before they uncover three false ones.
The children are shuffled backwards on chairs that literally move.
Co-host Shanthi Ranganathan is - as you may have guessed from context - Romesh's mum, and has previously appeared with him in several non-game shows including the travelogue Asian Provocateur and the topical discussion show The Ranganation. She tested the questions before the show, keeps score... and doesn't seem to do very much else.
"It's a 7/10 banger" seemed to be the consensus reaction: decent enough comedy, some fun questions testing pop culture knowledge, very little novelty, entertaining enough while it's on. Feels a little cheap: the top prize was around £10,000 per episode, and losing teams appear not to get any money for their charity.
