I’ve erased all of those memories,” Travis Kelce jokes of the dating show he led in 2016 before telling PEOPLE what he learned from set and applied to ‘Are You Smarter Than a Celebrity?’
While the Kansas City Chiefs tight end is no stranger the TV screen as a professional NFL player, he’s putting the football down and picking the microphone up for a new on-screen endeavor as host of Are You Smarter Than a Celebrity? on Prime Video.
Kelce’s TV highlight reel spans more than just running plays and completing passes, however, having had a starring role in his eponymous reality show Catching Kelce in 2016. The dating show, which premiered on E! network, saw 50 women compete for his love throughout its seven episodes.
In an exclusive interview with PEOPLE ahead of his new series’ premiere on Oct. 16, Kelce reflected on the last time he led a television show and revealed the “one thing” he learned from his Catching Kelce days and applied to his hosting gig on Are You Smarter Than a Celebrity?.
“I’ve erased all of those memories,” Kelce, 35, jokingly replied without hesitation when asked what he’s transferred over from the dating show to the game show.
“What show are you talking about there?” he added with a laugh. “I’m kidding.”
Jokes aside, the three-time Super Bowl winner shared the lesson he learned in 2016 that helped him out on Are You Smarter Than a Celebrity?, despite the show being “a completely different genre” in comparison.
“I guess I learned how to kind of patiently wait on set,” Kelce revealed. He referenced the process of “getting the cameras ready” before filming is “a little bit more waiting than people realize,” especially “in the entertainment and TV world,” he explained.
“I think that was probably the one thing I learned from Catching Kelce,” the NFL star admitted.
Meanwhile, Kelce was quick to sing the praises of the team who helped bring Are You Smarter Than a Celebrity? to life regardless of the nitty-gritty factors that can slow down production when setting up the perfect shot.
At the same time, everybody at Amazon and everybody that was a part of the show made it so easy and so fun to be on set filming,” Kelce recalled. “Everything was just being knocked out.”
Are You Smarter Than a Celebrity? is a spinoff of the Jeff Foxworthy-led game show Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader?, which ran for multiple seasons since its premiere on Fox in 2007. With Kelce as host, the Prime Video series will see contestants rely on the help of celebrities.
Among the stars who appear on the show include Nikki Glaser, Garcelle Beauvais and Lala Kent. They’ll be tapped to assist contestants in answering elementary school questions in a range of subjects, rather than compete against students in the Foxworthy series, in hopes of winning $100,000.
Kelce called Are You Smarter Than a Celebrity? as a “nice little twist” of the game show classic, sharing that he “always thought that was a really fun show.” He continued, “Now that I had a chance to revamp it a little bit, kind of make it my own and I don’t know… I was really excited about it.”
A self-described “huge game show fan,” the star athlete said he and his brother Jason Kelce “loved watching Game Show Network growing up” — and they would do it “all day long.” He recalled, “We would just pig out on the couch and just laugh our tails off at all the fun game shows
Are You Smarter Than a Celebrity? is just one of Kelce’s latest on-screen credits being adding to his resume. The football player made his acting debut on Oct. 2, appearing in Ryan Murphy’s Grotesquerie alongside Niecy Nash-Betts.
Kelce plays a character named Ed in the horror series, which he previously said he was excited for viewers to see his work when speaking on his New Heights with Jason and Travis Kelce podcast. “I cannot wait to see everybody’s reaction of me being in a mystery thriller. Kinda scary,” he said.
