Monday, July 26, 2010

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, MR. ELTON JOHN? Nigel Lythgoe is apparently returning to helm American Idol, and if so may junk all the existing judges in favor of folks like Justin Timberlake, Chris Isaak, Harry Connick Jr. and, yes, the gentleman in the title of this post.

Well, it's at least a better idea than the new Bieber Rule, insofar as changing the judges may bring back more adult viewer-voters, and end the dominance of the tween power-dialers. Hmm.

6 comments:

  1. Cecilia6:45 AM

    Well, that's intereresting  . . . I was all set on this last season being my last of Idol, but I may tune in to see THAT.  And that's why I think this idea is a smart one -- just replacing Simon with someone else was not going to keep a lot of the people ready to use this as the reason to break with Idol.  But a wholesale change (perhaps as a transition year to new permanent judges?) might make a lot of people (like me) pause.  Now they just need to pick some buzz-worthy singers this year to cement any buzz that the change in format might generate.

    And excellent point, Adam, about it not being geared at the Bieber tweens.  It's adults they're losing right now.

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  2. Aimee1:22 PM

    I agree with Cecilia.  I can't really imagine the show working with the current panel of judges plus a Simon replacement.  I might reconsider if they went with this idea, and I think the idea of using it as a transition year to a new permanent panel might work. 

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  3. Jenn.2:16 PM

    Let's see... get rid of Randy and have someone like Harry Connick, Jr. 

    Or keep Randy.

    Doesn't seem like much of a choice, now, does it?

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  4. Watchman2:18 PM

    I know...how about bringing back all-star singers who are better than the current contestants and continually show them up each week but aren't eligble for votes?  Would that work?

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  5. isaac_spaceman5:24 PM

    Nigel runs a tight ship at SYTYCD, but my recollection is that it was on his watch that AI locked itself into fetishizing archaic music.  He is a bit of an old-fashioned guy, complaining on SYTYCD about hip-hop and house music, lauding tap dancing and traditional ballroom styles, name-checking people who have been dead for decades.  Idol, for the most part, celebrates a kind of music that was out of style even during Idol's heyday, so obviously the show can be both old-fashioned and ridiculously successful.  I still think it needs to restore its credibility with another mega-artist (like Underwood or Daughtry), and I think the only way to get there is to cast a wide net, make an effort to identify and clear songs that the contestants want to sing (this requires some planning, and maybe some money), and stop making every nascent Daughtry sing disco or every would-be Underwood sing Rat Pack.  How hard would it be to ask every contestant, at the Top 24 stage, to spend a day compiling and submitting a list of 20 songs they'd like to cover, plus three or four songs in each potential theme night, so that the lawyers could start negotiating clearances?  They could make the clearance payments contingent upon the song actually being used, but if they do all the negotiation up-front, then they'd be in a great position to have the songs cleared.  Under this system, do you think there's any chance that Meghan Joy [Corkrey] yells "caw, caw" at the end of her turn on Michael Jackson night? 

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  6. J. Bowman8:10 PM

    I don't know, dawg. Harry Connick's just aaight for me, y'know? I'm just not feelin' it.
    Dawg.

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