. . . and then there were 24.

But, first, I re-learned a valuable lesson. Never compose a long post on-line. You never know when your connection is going to be lost in the middle of a save, and you’ll lose the first 300 words or more of your post. ::sigh::

Let’s just hit some of the more memorable people from last night to see where we’re ending up:

Anna Kearns is best known as the woman Simon compared to a giraffe. She’s about as tall as I am (I’m nearly 6′4″) and she wears heels. She didn’t make it through, though. She was stunned by this news, despite the fact that, by her own admission, she’s not the best singer. She thought being unique was enough. She didn’t define “unique,” but she swore that didn’t mean tall. I’m as confused as Simon was by this last night.

Tammy, the pedicab driver with the lip ring, did not make it through. That only mildly surprised me.

Melinda Doolittle, the shy background singer, made it through, as did fellow background singer Brandon Rogers. It’s remarkable how many professional singers and singers with previous contracts are making it far on this show these days. Remember when this felt more like an amateur singing competition with well-meaning kids stuck in karaoke bars? No more. The only stipulation is that you’re not under contract now and you’re 28 or younger. There’s even rumors that they might up that to 30 next season. Wow.

Gina Glocksen finally made it through to the top 24. She’s been to Hollywood before, but this will now be her last year. Simon smiled when the news was delivered to her. That’s always an odd sight.

Haley Scarnado, I’m happy to say, made it through. Her last song choice was “It’s All Coming Back To Me Now.” Anyone who sings a Jim Steinman-penned song deserves to go through to the next week, unless they butcher it. That’s a standing policy here at VariousandSundry.com

Phil Stacy is getting scary looking, and just a tad freaky. He’s the guy who left his wife in labor to audition for the show. And now he’s made it all the way through to the Top 24.

It’s 2:30 p.m. on the day of taping at this point in the show, and they still have 28 contestants to weed through. Filming started that morning and they still haven’t gotten through half the contestants. Why does this take so long? I understand production schedules are slow things. But there’s no reason they can’t make it through 8 or 10 contestants an hour with breaks for lunch and technical gaffes here and there and NOT be done well before the 8:00 p.m. time they wound up finishing at, as I recall.

Imagine being one of those 40 kids sitting in the holding room literally all day. Torture.

Tangent: The boys got to go see THE SIMPSONS MOVIE at a special preview showing for them during Hell Week. I know it’s a product placement plug by FOX, but that’s still pretty darn cool. They also visited the studios, where we saw that much of the staff works on tablet computers.

Chris Sligh is getting my vote every week just for being funny. Again, I know it’s horribly unfair of me, but I’ll deal with it. He took the long walk from the elevator to the chair in front of the judges and promptly said, “I know you’re all wondering why I called this meeting today.” (Slight paraphrase, but you get the point.) The kid’s hilarious and he’s got a great voice. He’s through.

As is Blake Lewis, the beatbox boy. That surprised me. I can’t wait to see how long it takes before he breaks out the beats and Simon castigates him for it. I hope he makes it through to the top 12 so he can do the beats during one of the group numbers somewhere along the way. I wonder if he pops and locks, too? Maybe Nigel Lythgoe can put him on SO YOU THINK YOU CAN DANCE this summer, of IDOL doesn’t work out for him. . .

Paul Kim is the Asian man who wants you to remember him as your AI Asian Singer, and not William Hung. I’m not a big fan of his singing, though. His final song choice in Hell Week was an awful series of runs and warbling and needless syllable additions. I could barely recognize the song. As an added bonus, he’s proud to let the world know that he plans on wearing the same underwear on every cut day because it’s been lucky for him. He also plans on being barefoot during all shows, as his little trademark thing. Oh, boy.

Tatiana McConnico did not make it through. That makes her 2 for 2, as she previously failed as a contestant on STAR SEARCH. A lot of people, though, had picked her as an early favorite and will be shocked at this one.

Leslie Hunt is a slight redhead with a very airy wispy voice that I can’t recall ever seeing before last night’s show. She’s through.

So is Nick Pedro, the guy who quit the show last year, only to return stronger this year.

Matthew Buckstein, one of the trio of cowboys from last season, did not make it through.

Lakisha Jones, the large single mother from NYC, made it, though. She has a powerful voice.

Nicole Tranquilo makes it through. She’s cute.

Sadly, Jersey Girl Antonella Barba made it through over the more talented Marisa Rhodes, in the decision that will baffle America for ages to come.

Ditto for Sundance Head — who famously sang through his nose — over Tommy Daniels.

Tommy took the decision much better than Marisa. Wait, no he didn’t. Marisa cried and didn’t understand. Tommy swore and flipped the bird.

Ah, well.

Next Tuesday: The 12 boys compete for your vote!

This entry was posted on Thursday, February 15th, 2007 at 9:28 am and is filed under American Idol. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.