(Edited 2003-02-11 to fix the “celebrity spelling bee” link, which originally had a line break in it that caused it not to work.)

I am not making this up: Fox will be airing a celebrity spelling bee starting this Friday (yes, Friday the 13th– how appropriate…), with semifinals on the following Friday and finals in two weeks.

Gimmicky, you say? Sure, it is; and there couldn’t be a better time for it, what with the hit documentary Spellbound just having been released on video. Ridiculous as the idea of a celebrity spelling competition may seem, I still think I’m going to watch it; first of all, it sounds like there’s a potential for hilarity, especially among some of the more… dense… celebrities, and second, having participated in the National Spelling Bee myself, there’s a certain nostalgia factor to be found in watching such competitions.