It's Mr & Mr...

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It was the hit Seventies show which revealed - for better or worse - just how much married couples knew about each other.

But when Mr and Mrs returns to our screens shortly it will have been brought bang up to date.

Desperate to reflect the more liberal Noughties society, one idea being considered by production company Celador is to allow gay or unmarried couples to take part.

Other relationships, including that of siblings or bosses and their employees, may also feature in the series.

Original host Derek Batey owns the rights to the show and has given Celador, which is behind Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, permission to develop the format.

However, last night he was determined that it should not be open to all couples. 'I would prefer the programme to concentrate on married couples as the titles suggests,' he said.

'If they confer with me then there will not be any gay couples or siblings - I do think it should concentrate on Mr and Mrs.

'It is a format that has lasted throughout the times and I see no reason to change it. I'm sure modern audiences will love it.'

Mr and Mrs began as a regional production in the 1960s before ITV started airing it as a daytime show in 1973.

Few can forget its theme tune, which featured the lyrics 'Mr and Mrs! Be nice to each other/ Mr and Mrs! We've gotta love one another!'.

As the show grew in popularity, it was moved to Saturday night prime time in the late 1970s and won audiences of up to 11million.

The idea was simple: one partner sat in a soundproofed booth while the other answered three questions about their spouse.

The pair then swapped places - and Batey would compare the couple's answers about each other. If they got one question correct they won £10 but if they concurred on all six they scooped the jackpot of up to £2,000.

Losers were consoled by a carriage clock - although the fun would always be to see how they reacted when they realised they did not know their spouse as well as they thought they did.

In 1988, after falling audiences meant the show was shunted back to daytime, it was pulled by ITV. There have already been two attempts to bring it back.

A 1994 UK Living version called The New Mr and Mrs failed to find any fans while an 'ironic' kitsch ITV revival in 1999, hosted by Julian Clary, fared even worse - and just six episodes were made.

Yet the show has not disappeared-from the public mind. Batey, now 77, has brought out a board game and interactive DVD featuring the sort of questions that would have appeared on screen and he also had a successful cabaret act.

A spokesman for Celador said the company believed there was still a market for the show, and insisted it would not be following the 'camp' route of the Clary programme.

He said: 'It is still at the developmental stage and we are working out whether it is just married couples or if it will be open to people with all sorts of relationships.

'A lot of how the final version will look, as well as who will be the host, will depend on what network picks it up.'

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