More kids, please

Reboot of show about funny children now focuses too much on celebrity status

Kids Say the Darndest Things Debuts Sunday, Global/abc DANIEL D’ADDARIO

LOS ANGELES In its first hour, ABC’S revival of Kids Say the Darndest Things seems more focused on making clear that host Tiffany Haddish says the most familiar things.

Haddish is a performer who chooses not to modulate.

That’s an easier fit with a flamboyant, scripted movie comedy than with a series that places Haddish in conversation with real kids. The children of Kids Say are supporting players to Haddish’s brash lead, and they either attempt to meet her energy in a manner that never seems uncoached, or they tap out, seeming vaguely unmoored by the situation and its chaos.

All of which works against what was supposed to be the idea of the show. We get a flashback to the show’s beginning in the Kids Say pilot, with clips of Art Linkletter interviewing youngsters in segments from his series House Party Back then, Linkletter’s low-key interviewing style allowed young people the space to express their view of society.

Haddish can’t help but mug over the kids she’s supposed to be introducing, and redirects the conversation perpetually to her celebrity status.

She talks past a trio of young girls in order to communicate that she is friends with Taylor Swift and asks another if he’s seen an animated film in order to announce that she played a voice role in it. It’s dispiriting to watch a show that was at some point about celebrating the innocent world views of children lean so heavily into a point-of-view that places celebrities at the centre of the universe. In this, it gets the equation of how to bring together young people and stars precisely and disastrously backward.