Grease Live: Week One
GREASE isn’t exactly American Idol, but the comparisons are obvious. I laughed out loud last night during the first live episode when a judge panellist told a singer to be less pop and more Broadway. That’s the exact inverse of what the judges tell the contestants on American Idol.
And, yes, GREASE gives us a “panel,” while AI has “judges. ” I was surprised, though, to hear the panellists saying anything negative. Given that they need someone to win this competition that America likes, you’d like they’d put on a dog and pony show here. You don’t want to be the guy putting $10 million dollars up and being stuck with a Danny that you’ve been bashing for the last six weeks. They were more honest and critical than I thought they’d be, though I suppose they can afford to be this early on.
It helps that the contestants all know how to sing. It’s mostly a matter of fine-tuning their performances, encouraging them, and giving them advice for the next round.
There were two glaring exceptions, though. They brought back two contestants to round the cast up to 14 contestants, from 12. These two didn’t make the cut originally, but no doubt garnered enough fan reaction that they thought it would make good TV to bring them back. That would be Long Island 50s Expert, Matt Nolan, and emotionally overloaded Ashley A. They both stunk. It might have been nerves on the latter, but neither could hold a note. Matt covered it up better, often pulling out of long notes just before his voice cracked. Ashley couldn’t hold two notes together if she tried. It was embarrassing for her. She was the first Crash And Burn of the season.
The show opened with a group musical number in which the high spandex pants did the girls no favors. I felt bad for them. Then Billy Bush described the show as having “the most unique prize” in television history. Call me a grammarian, but any modifier on the word “unique” makes my teeth grind.
The contestants all sang in pairs. Each would perform a song separately, then be judged together. Comparisons were inevitable, but it didn’t cause any spectacularly embarrassing moments for anyone this week. The pairs seemed to be well chosen, to show versatility or levels of skill.
Derek went first with “Crazy Little Thing.” He sounded good, and wasn’t afraid to move around the stage.
Austin, who I thought was the favorite going in, opened with “Moany Moany.” (Is that how you spell it?) He added a bunch of gratuitous high notes, but that’s not all together a bad thing. GREASE has a few of those, and he’ll need to show he can hit them. There’s just something a little too confident in his appearance that bothered me, but I was impressed at the way he ran around the stage and didn’t run out of breath in his singing.
Allie did “I Love Rock N Roll.” She’s only 19, but the hair and makeup made her look well into her 20s. I wasn’t in love with the performance. She seemed a little tentative and awkward at times, though her voice was good. She also had a lot of dead looks during the song. Broadway is all about overacting. She’ll learn.
Kate sang one of my favorite IDOL songs, “All By Myself.” (LaToya London nailed it once.) She hit the high and long notes. She looked confident. She’s a great singer with a great look. She’s an early favorite for me.
Max the Slacker has a long way to go to overcome his slacker look. He’s not believable just yet as Danny, but I think he might learn. He has to unpop that collar, too. His voice is great, though. He did “Summer of 69.”
Jason has a bit of a boy band background, and has done musical theater before. He performed “Faith,” but I was distracted the entire time by the prop microphone he held. His voice was carried by the headset he wore, but he often didn’t have the mic up to his mouth when he’d start singing. You’d expect the voice to be a little softer at those points, but it didn’t matter at all. The sound stayed the same. It was very distracting and unnecessary. That said, he’s got an amazing voice.
Laura did “Why Do Fools Fall In Love.” She acted well, but we were all too distracted by her weird yellow outfit with white boots to notice. The producer thought she might be too sweet and too nice. We’ll see if she does something more “dangerous” in the next show, now. And Billy Bush awkwardly asked for his shorts back. Ick.
Kathleen went with “Suddenly I See,” a very ODD choice of song for a Broadway audition. She did what she could with it. I thought it was ironic that the song with “hell” in it multiple times was the one sung by the prayer leader.
Kevin did “Walking In Memphis,” which the judges seemed fairly lukewarm on, even through their positive comments. He has a strong voice, but I wonder if he’s just not too preppy looking for the musical.
I also noticed at this point that the way to show you are “Broadway” is to sing with your arms spread wide. It screams “musical theater.”
Chad had “Signed Sealed Delivered.” I thought he was overacting a bit, but the judges thought he was great and some thought he was the best of the night. I guess I don’t know Broadway enough. Good voice, though, and he did do a great job of building the song up to an exciting pitch at the end.
Juliana got stuck with “The First Cut Is The Deepest,” which she failed to pull all the emotion out of. I thought, though, that she had the most powerful, most confident, and most controlled voice of all the girls. She made me a believer that she could star on Broadway today.
Ashley S. finished the night with “It’s In His Kiss,” and couldn’t help but pale in comparison to Juliana. She sang it in key and acted well, but her voice wilted by comparison. Every time she sang “It’s In His Kiss,” it was way too soft and almost an afterthought. That annoyed me.
Jim - the guy who co-wrote GREASE in the first place - compared the two girls to Betty and Veronica. Very true.
One last note about the contestants: They’re all young, and a lot of them married young, too. There are kids here who wouldn’t normally be out of college who are already married. I don’t think there are any parents amongst them, though.
America voted last night. There is no show next week due to the Superbowl, so we’ll have our first eliminations in two weeks. If America gets it right, then the two late additions will also be the first two to leave. They were awful. There’s a LOT of talent up on that stage, all of whom would easily coast to Hollywood Hell Week on American Idol. But which one will star on Broadway? I just don’t know yet. Even I don’t have any favorites.
Related Various and Sundry Posts:
- Grease Premiere
- Clay Aiken sings “Grease” on American Idol’s BeeGees night (May 7, 2003)
- LaToya London sings “All By Myself” on AI (February 25, 2004)