Ellen launches spin-off show

WENDI McLendon-Covey AP

Viewers who watch Ellen DeGeneres’ shows on a fairly regular basis know that one of her fun features and unique comedic brainstorms is to get a celebrity to go to a store or shop and engage total strangers in spontaneous conversations.

The problem is, the star can’t ad lib anything that comes to mind, but has to repeat exactly what Ellen prompts him or her to say, by way of an earpiece the celebrity is wearing.

It’s a really fun “game” to play, because the star is caught off-guard by the “crazy” phrases or sentences Ellen thinks up, and the person the star is talking to is similarly thrown for a loop!

The occasional feature has been so successful that it’s now been “spun off” as a separate TV show, “#RepeatAfterMe,” with Ellen producing instead of hosting (the new show is hosted by Wendi McLendon-Covey).

The telecast of “#RepeatAfterMe” we caught recently featured three stars—Justin Bieber, Kristen Bell and Michael Bolton.

Kristen led off having her nails done at a beauty parlor, and her “victim” was a handyman who was called over to put up some blown-up sexy images of the star on the salon’s wall.

With the show’s host secretly feeding her the most outrageous things to say and do, Kristen had a hard time keeping her composure.

Sexy talk

As for the clueless handyman, Kristen’s “sexy” talk kinda made him suspect that she was “propositioning” him, so his own facial reactions were hilarious to watch!

To make the new program’s first portion particularly choice, it was timed to end just as the show itself was already being “taped as live.”

So, when Kristen and her “victim” left the salon, they walked straight into the production’s set, where the studio audience greeted them with an enthusiastic ovation—giving the handyman the scare and thrill of his life!

Bolton’s portion required him to go to a supermarket, where he was made to do loopy and embarrassing things like speaking “into” a banana—as if it were a telephone!

The big twist came when the woman he interacted with turned out to be a big fan of his—and really flipped and went to fan heaven when he serenaded her with one of his hit songs!

As for Justin Bieber, his scene was set in a bowling alley, where he pretended to be the klutziest bowler in the world, and a motherly matron had to teach him how to improve his game.

All three stars did well, but the program host wasn’t one of the new show’s plus points. She looked and sounded good, and was peppy and chatty and all that, but she made the basic hosting booboo of laughing at her own funny remarks.

We know that she was doing it to “cue” the studio audience and viewers at home to do the same. But she had the opposite effect, because we ended up not wanting to join her, since she had preempted us.

The TV hosting rule is: Laughing is the viewer’s prerogative, not the host’s. Loud and clear?