The Traitors could learn a lot from Elizabeth Hurley’s daft The Inheritance

Channel 4’s new cunning gameshow is even camper than The Traitors, and boasts Rob Rinder at the helm (Picture: Simon Webb/Channel 4)

Elizabeth Hurley is dead. Well, at least in the name of great reality television—specifically for Channel 4’s ridiculous new series, The Inheritance.

Rounding off her first summer of love with her achy-breaky new boyfriend, Billy Ray Cyrus, Liz Hurley is making quite the comeback in a show from the geniuses behind The Traitors – only somehow it’s campier, and instantly more panto.

Hurley is ‘The Deceased’, an enigmatic dead millionaire who has written her entire family out of her will, leaving her fortune to 13 strangers who must compete in a series of challenges to take home their share of the inheritance.

There is, of course, a twist.

At the end of each challenge, players must put themselves forward if they believe they deserve the cash the most.

Those who do then make their case to a jury—made up of the contestants who concede they didn’t work as hard – which decides the rightful beneficiary of the prize money won that day.

It raises the question: what does it really take to get what you deserve in life?

Arguably, there couldn’t be a more significant time for The Inheritance, when the disparity between rich and poor continues to soar, and the entitlement of wealth, land, and country is palpable.

The Traitors revived reality television when it launched in 2022 and is now, without a doubt, the biggest show in Britain. But it also caused a crisis: every production company in the world is trying to recreate that magic.

If a new show isn’t desperate to be called the ‘new Traitors,’ it’s the ‘new Race Across The World’—or, in the case of the recent BBC disaster Destination X, both.

None have come close. And none are likely to.

The Inheritance is the first time in a long time that a reality series doesn’t feel as though it’s trying to be something else.

The new show kicks off with a bang (Picture: Simon Webb/Channel 4 /PA Wire) We can’t imagine anyone else playing The Deceased other than Elizabeth Hurley (Picture: Simon Webb/Channel 4/PA Wire)

It’s actually inspired by a long-forgotten ITV flop, The Divided, presented by Andrew Castle until it was axed after just two series. Players answered general knowledge questions to build a prize pot and then had to decide among themselves the fairest way to split it.

The Inheritance takes that idea of fairness and runs with it—all the way to a ludicrously lavish Dorset manor—where you’ll find Hurley, 13 contestants (all loveable enough for a spot on Gogglebox), and one of the most criminally underrated stars of television: Rob Rinder.

Hurley is the face of The Inheritance, but its star is undoubtedly Rinder, who serves as Hurley’s executor. Before Rinder “cut his cloth,” so to speak, on daytime television as the UK’s answer to Judge Judy, he was a British criminal barrister. There is, quite literally, no one more perfect for this role.

Rinder is often overlooked as one of Britain’s best TV talents—perhaps because of his over-the-top beginnings on ITV daytime. He’s long overdue a primetime series that puts him right at the centre, where his sharp wit, commanding presence, and willingness to laugh at his own absurdity can be fully celebrated.

The Inheritance feels like the show Rinder was destined for. It simply wouldn’t have the same magic without him at the helm.

It’s been a long time since a show has come along that feels completely fresh (Picture: Simon Webb/Channel 4)

Thankfully, he also has a brilliant cast to play with: characters ranging from gamer Zara, 36, who seems determined to make as many enemies as possible with deluded self-belief, to Jesse, a disabled, boy-next-door student, 19, and a paramedic used to being underpaid, undervalued, and overworked.

Between the conventional ‘heroes and villains,’ almost all of the cast are genuinely funny. In just one episode, there are endless one-liners, and when battle lines are drawn, the verbal blows shouted across the stately home are simply gold.

The Inheritance is the closest contender in the last four years to be held in the same esteem as The Traitors—and even manages to resolve my only gripe with Claudia Winkleman’s juggernaut. The opening episodes of The Traitors – or even Big Brother – are always, without fail, infuriating because the best characters get picked off too soon.

The show doesn’t cull anyone—at least not in the beginning—and the most unhinged personalities get their chance to wreak the havoc they were recruited for before they’re cut, long after we’re done with them.

It’s been a long time since a show has come along that feels completely fresh – and proves itself worth sticking with after just one episode. The Inheritance is an unexpected masterpiece that deserves to live a long and prosperous life, even if Liz Hurley had to die in the process.

The Inheritance launches August 31 on Channel 4

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