St. Malo family wins $10,000 on Family Feud

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This article was published 02/02/2024 (547 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A St. Malo family has won $10,000 on a game show where families square off against one another.

The Lambert family won the prize playing on Family Feud Canada in September. Their episodes aired Jan. 24, 25, and 29 and can be watched on CBC Gem.

“It was actually my daughter’s idea. She thought it would be fun so she did a video for an audition for us and then we sat on it for probably about two years because we thought it wasn’t any good and we would never get on and then this past spring she decided to send it in on a whim. And within a week they called us back and said they would like us to do an online audition,” said Christina Lambert.

Passing the online audition in April, the family didn’t know if they would be on the show until September. That’s when the CBC paid for the hotel and airfare for the Lamberts to come to Toronto.

“My daughter was so excited. She thought this would be fun for us to do and it would be a good family experience and it really was. It was a blast. We had a great time,” said Lambert.

Lambert played with her daughter Caycie Dueck, son Cody, husband Victor, and niece Denise Matity. She said competing was a shock.

“They try to prepare you in your audition. They do a mock game and they give you a full rehearsal against another family prior to you going there. But it’s nerve wracking. You walk into the studio and it’s all dark and it’s grey and there’s no lights on and then the lights come on and then it gets real. You get in there and it’s just like TV. It’s quite an eye opener. It was nerve wracking but once you settle in and they start asking you questions and you start playing we settled in and we had a great time. It was a lot of fun. It was a lot of laughs, it was really good. It was a great experience.”

Lambert said the hardest questions during the whole experience came when they were in rehearsal and were squaring off against another family for the first time. The Lamberts came back to their dressing area afterwards and just wondered what they were doing there and how terrible they were at playing the game.

“I guess because we were nervous (we played badly). These were the hardest questions because they were the first ones they asked us and they were our first kick at the cat being on stage and everything. Those were tough. I think the hardest question was one of the last questions we were asked. It’s always very difficult when you’re faced with pressure to steal the points back from the other team. We had a couple of opportunities where we did well. It was tough all around but we managed to pull through and I don’t think we embarrassed ourselves too badly,” she said with a laugh.

The taping took one day to film all three episodes. The Lamberts won the first game where they won $10,000; they won the second game but failed to win $10,000 and they lost in their third game.

The Lamberts love Halloween. For the spooky holiday they decorate their house to the nines and build a scary haunted house in their garage to scare older kids that come trick or treating. For their game, the men wore Halloween themed suits with orange pumpkins on them while the women wore black dresses with Halloween themed scarves.

“When we auditioned, we auditioned in costumes because in our little community we do a big Halloween display and people know us (as) ‘Oh yeah, those are the Halloween people from down the street.’ So, we thought if we’re going to try and get on the show we needed something that would make us stand out from the crowd so let’s do the Halloween thing,” said Lambert.

She advises people thinking of being on the show, not to wait as they did.

“What I found was they have a preponderance of people from Ontario. I guess because obviously most of Canada’s population lives in Ontario. If you’re from other areas of Canada and you’re a fun family and you’re not shy, then I would suggest to do a video and send it in and see what happens, they can only tell you no. Even if they do tell you no just doing the audition with the people from CBC and the production company, it’s such a great experience that I would recommend it to anyone. They’re a real class act. We had a great time. We had a lot of fun.”