ITV has revealed a brand-new ‘lifeline’ available to contestants of its revived Who Wants To Be A Millionaire which returns to screens this weekend hosted by brand new presenter, Jeremy Clarkson.
As well as the familiar lifelines of ‘Ask The Audience’, ‘Phone a Friend’ and ’50:50’, contestants will be able to ‘Ask The Host’ and see if Clarkson can help them take home a big money prize.
Clarkson said: “If the contestant chooses that lifeline, they get to ask me if I know the answer. God help them.
“Anyone who doesn’t win £1,000,000 is bound, at some point, to ask me if I know the answer. And if it’s 1970’s prog rock music, I probably will. If it’s anything other than that, I probably won’t.”
In another twist, contestants will be able to set their own second safety net amount. There is a fixed safety net at £1,000, meaning once a contestant has successfully answered Question 5 and won £1,000, that’s the minimum they will take home.
Traditionally, the second safety net was automatically set at £32,000. However, in the new run this new twist will allow the second safety net to be set by each contestant.
“Once they have banked £1,000, they will be given the opportunity to set their safety net ahead of the next question being asked.
“They can set their safety net only once and anywhere from £2,000 to £500,000.
On talking about the safety net changes, Clarkson added “They can choose where it goes. So they choose how much they are going to lose at any given moment, which is a very clever idea.
“That requires balls of steel.
“To go beyond, say £32,000, when you’re going to drop back to £1,000 if you get it wrong. To say, ‘no I’ll set it at £64,000 and risk losing £63,000 if I get it wrong’, balls of steel.”
Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? starts Saturday 5th May at 9.15pm on ITV and continues nightly thorough-out the week at 9pm