ITV star ‘lets slip’ Ant and Dec’s plans to bring back iconic TV show
ITV star Cat Deeley has hinted her former co-presenters Ant and Dec could be reviving a beloved 90s kids’ TV show.
The This Morning star, 48, cut her teeth in the world of presenting alongside the Geordie duo, both 49, on SM:TV Live.
The children’s programme aired every Saturday morning for five years from 1998 until it was axed in 2003.
However, on today’s This Morning, Cat appeared to let slip the I’m A Celebrity presenters had plans to reboot SM:TV Live after more than two decades.
Cat and co-host Ben Shephard had been interviewing Stephen Mulhern, 47, who reminisced about 90s and 00s kids’ TV and said he ‘missed’ the Saturday morning programming block.
The Stas In Their Eyes presenter then teased: ‘Actually, Ant and Dec have been talking about maybe bringing back a Saturday morning kids’ show. Be great if they did.’
Ant and Dec previously told Metro they felt ‘passionate’ about the importance of Saturday morning TV – and were gunning for its comeback; even if they aren’t involved.
‘I don’t think we could host it now, we’d have to let a younger generation do it,’ Ant said.
‘We feel passionately that those kind of Saturday morning TV shows on terrestrial telly are important to kids, as important now as when we were growing up.
‘It’s where you see your music, it’s where you see all your cultural references, it’s where you are informed about what other kids like to watch and see and so you feel like you should become a fan too.
‘It would be great if somebody bucked the trend of cooking shows.’
The Limitless Win presenters became coy when pressed out their projects in the pipeline.
Ant cautiously explained: ‘We’ll be spending a lot more time developing things for us and for other people. I don’t want to give too much away because there are definitely certain things…’
SM:TV Live saw A-list celebrities join in on fun and games of the ITV studio, often involving embarrassing sketches, gunge, and an angry Dec.
Top moments included Challenge Ant, where you’d go head-to-head with the host in order to win yourself games consoles, The Beautiful Corrs (who were just so beautiful) and, of course, Friends send-up Chums.
It also produced the iconic sketch Chums, a parody of Friends, which was later recreated for a 2021 episode of Ant and Dec’s Saturday Night Takeaway.
Other Saturday morning children’s TV shows of that era include CD:UK and Live and Kicking.
This Morning airs weekdays from 10am on ITV.
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