Over The Rainbow: Week Three
Published on Monday 12th April, 4.17pm, Written by Mike Shaw
Dear BBC, stop trying to pull the wool over the eyes of the British public by not explicitly telling us that the Over The Rainbow results shows aren’t live.
With our TV schedules overflowing with talent shows and a variety of other programmes that ask for the viewers to vote, it’s an expectation that the results are broadcast live, and while the Beeb doesn’t say that they are live, they aren’t saying that they’re not live either. They know what they’re doing, and it’s only fair that everyone at home knows too. When you tune into the Sunday show, the results were decided about 24 hours and the unfortunate contestant’s tears are long since dry.
Anyway, with that out of the way, we can have a proper look at this week’s programme, where the girl left picking up the shattered pieces of her West End dream was Bronte.
It was a shame to see her go, but Bronte just wasn’t at her best on Saturday. Her partner in the bottom two was Lauren, which came as a surprise. She was better than some of the other contestants, despite flitting between a crisp RP English accent and generic stagey American during her performance of I’ll Never Fall In Love Again. Following comments on Twitter however, its seems that her perceived arrogance is outweighing her talent and turning viewers against her which may explain her low ranking this week. That said, she survived to fight another week, so will doubtless be on a charm offensive next Saturday.
Lauren and Bronte faced one another in this week's sing-off
Andrew Lloyd Webber seemed to be genuine when delivering the final blow, telling Bronte that she has a real talent and that she must stay in touch with him and the judging panel. For her part, Bronte displayed a lot of grace during her departure and handled herself well despite her fellow contestants doing their best to reduce her to tears by wailing, shaking with anguish and mouthing ‘I love you’ during her final performance of Somewhere Over The Rainbow.
The one plus point to this collective outpouring of grief was that Jessica was too busy sobbing to pull daft faces while performing and was more tolerable as a result. Producers should take note of this and try to replicate the scenario every week. Perhaps just before she takes the stage tell her that her parents have been kidnapped? Just a suggestion…
See The Wizard of Oz for yourself!
Some quick hits on the other contestants:
Dani is still a hot favourite. She has a subtlety that other contestants lack and at 16 has the most potential.
Steph did It’s Oh So Quiet by Bjork (yes, I know it wasn’t originally by her) and was brilliant. Once she conquers her habit of grinning wildly during everything, she could be a contender. Steph’s great song choice raised a question though: who picks the songs, the contestants or the producers?
I only ask because there is a massive disparity in suitability. While some songs are spot-on and give the singers the chance to show what they can do, others are the sort of nonsense a tone-deaf person chooses to do at a karaoke night. That Don’t Impress Me Much, with its variety of jokey spoken bits, was of no help at all to Sophie, while The Boy Does Nothing made Emilie look uncomfortable and clumsy. Both are talented singers, but this week they looked like under-rehearsed am dram performers
Sophie got lucky. As much as I like her, she was bad all round this week, and really needs to raise her game.
The big surprise of the week was the emergence of Danielle as one to watch. In interviews she seemed lovely, her performance of a relatively little-known song by Amy Studt was the best of the night, and her acting alongside the Scarecrow in a scene from The Wizard of Oz was better than her rivals’. Unlike the other girls, Danielle didn’t attempt a ropey American accent; she just focused on getting her lines and delivery right, which even Sheila Hancock commented on.
Once again, Sheila showed that she is the only judge on the panel worth listening to. While John Partridge and Charlotte Church love everyone and only dole out criticism once it has been heavily sugar-coated, Sheila tells the truth, whether the contestants want to hear it or not. But she not cruel, like Simon Cowell, or completely off-topic like Louis Walsh — everything she says is entirely justified and intended to help the girls improve. Whatever ALW chooses to focus on next, St Sheila has to be on the panel.
Her best moment of the week came when she told Jessica not to get carried away by the audience applauding every time someone hits a high note, the subtext being ‘don’t let these idiots fool you into thinking you’re doing well’.
We think it, she says it.
We’ll be live Tweeting again next Saturday at www.twitter.com/westendupdates from 7.15pm. See you there.
Best Dorothy of the week: Danielle
Really like your write-up of the show and the running Twitter commentary on the night. Keep it up!
Hiya, just found this blog and will be making a point of reading every week! Always good to see what others think about the show – I write my own blog about it each week too: http://millie-moo-and-chewbagga.blogspot.com/
Also enjoy the twitter commentary!
Dani is the favourite? Oh dear, that must mean my judging accuracy is going severely downhill then because i don’t think she is anything like good enough vocally.
Danielle was excellent last week, as was scouse Steph (although her lisp and insistence on bright red lippy is annoying)
Great review – the only thing I disagree with is the fact that Emilie would have been fine if not for her song choice. She’s had a range of different songs, and maybe she’s just pissed off whoever’s in charge of song choices, but she’s been consistently a lot weaker than the rest of the girls.
Perhaps it’s a combination of a lot of things, like nerves or feeling like she doesn’t really belong as the wildcard, but as harsh as it sounds all that stuff is kind of irrelevant. If you can’t pull it together and deliver a good performance once you’re out on the stage then you’re not really going to be able to cope any better when you’re performing 8 shows a week and facing constant scrutiny by critics and, more importantly in my opinion, the general public.
Danielle is definitely my pick. Her acting is subtle and genuine, and I think she’s got the potential to develop really well vocally as well.
Not being funny. I’m a simple person. I actually never figured that the results Sunday show was not live but ,now that I think of it, it very probably isn’t . Which is good. The loser gets lots of support in handling it. And the loser gets the opportunity at the end to show and present both her talent and character to interested theatre connoiseurs who could be instrumental in shaping their future careers. Sorry, but most of the viewers are happy with the BBC producers contrive the show to be.
I do however agree that some of the competitors are given bad songs and acts that serve them badly. I’m sure, as well, that it’s the producers fault. There is obviously lord and producer devious and deliberate sabotage going on.
Dannielle and Steph are the best and I agree that they are the lord’s favouites. However, the British public don’t need your guidance any more than the lord’s.
Take a good look at yourself.
Now I’ve said too much
Woah! Say what you want to say but for me Dannielle is stunning for me the performance level..Mesmerize me !sigh