American Idol 2009: Hollywood Week Round 3
On this final audition day from Hollywood, Ryan’s in another cute sweater. He looks adorable! Is that the image he’s trying for? His ‘this is serious now’ voice is great for adding to the drama; he’s so expressive! ‘Do or Die’ … no, there’s more at stake than that. From 103,000 people down to 72 … the contestants left now can almost smell the live shows. It’s going to be good to see which of them start to look like potential recording artists once they’re on stage with a band and backing singers.
The episode starts at the end of the day and Ryan explains that the contestants have been split into four rooms as we watch the judges divide the contestants up into groups. There won’t be any judges’ comments after each song, so we’ll have to wait until the end of the show to find out who they thought was great and who sucked — unless we catch sight of Simon’s reaction.
First up was my favourite, Adam Lambert. Kara said he’s still doing musical theatre, but he’ll get through. He is theatrical, but that’s not the same thing. Matt Giraud has a really good voice too. Ryan pointed the stress spotlight at Danny Gokey and Jamar Rogers. They’re going to be split at some point (and Jamar is probably the one to go) so it feels like a plot device — love it! Jamar’s audition was actually pretty good, the best I’ve heard him. He’s more contemporary than Danny, but Danny has the better voice. Paula was jumping up and down… I think she likes him!
Anoop Desai was still in good voice. He definitely should get through to the top 12. Jorge Nunez and Scott McIntire are both likely candidates for the final 36 but I liked Scott less this time. Ryan said that Kendall Beard had one last chance, but she sounded pretty good to me. Stevie Wright looks like Sally Fletcher from Home and Away, but she can sing. Lil Rounds has to be another sure bet for the next round. Ryan talked about the drama surrounding Kristen McNamara on group day and asked what she would say if Nancy was sitting behind her ready to say sorry. She totally fell for it — too funny, Ryan! This show would be even better if Ryan got to toy with the contestants a bit more. He’s good at it. Mishavonna Henson has been off my radar so far, but I really liked her voice.
As Ryan describes how the contestants are being divided into groups and moved to different rooms, you get the feeling that the producers are just messing with the contestants’ heads now. And then messing with ours by showing far too much of Tatiana. I like her less every time I hear her sing and she has a special brand of crazy. I liked Alexis Grace. Even though her vocal wasn’t perfect, there was something about it that just worked. Kenny Hoffpauer sang fairly well but didn’t look comfortable on stage and Jasmine Murray sounded a little flat. Nathaniel Marshall sounds totally different on stage. Joanna Pacitti bombed out, forgetting her words which Ryan said was a disaster. Why don’t the contestants make up words if they forget the lyrics? Casey Carlson and Stephen Fowler also lost their lyrics. While Casey recovered it reasonably well, Stephen stropped off the stage. I still like him though so I hope he gets another chance. As Ryan pointed out, Brooke White once asked to start over on one of the live shows and got away with it.
We get more footage of them messing with the contestants’ heads by putting them into different rooms. Tatiana gets moved from one room to another as the judges try to even up the numbers. Nick Mitchell stuck with his Normund Gentle persona but looked quite nervous about which way the judges would decide. Ryan points out that Laneshe Young, who he described as an early favourite, is in room 3 and Nick Mitchell is in room 4. When he says that “some can’t help but wonder if being in the same room as Nick is a good thing”, you know they’re pushing us to think that room 4 is going home and room 3 is through … so perversely, I’m expecting the opposite. When Tatiana joins room 4, I’m definitely hoping they’re playing it straight but I still think they’re just creating tension. And as Ryan says that the judges have made their final decisions, we’ll hopefully find out now. I love the shot of Simon saying “bye, all” as he heads off to get a flight. Why did they include that? So funny!
Expressive!Ryan is back and his hands could tell you the story now with the sound off. He is a perfect host for this show … just the right balance between deadly serious and sarcastic cheesiness. I wonder how long he’s spent working out what to do with his hands on camera — looking that natural can’t come naturally. Love him!
Room 2 is the first to be put out of their misery, and they’re through. The remaining three judges tried to make the contestants believe they were being cut but they aren’t as good at this kind of thing as Simon and Ryan. I guess if you’re as tired and stressed as the contestants must be at this point, you’ll fall for it, but us at home? I think not. On to group 3 and listening to India Morrison’s performance, they can’t be going any further. Most of the people in this room don’t look like stars either … missing the ‘x’ factor. Bye, then! Randy puts them out of their misery fairly quickly, I guess they only want to wind up those who’ve made it through.
Ryan says that room 1 was the first group to be placed … but as that’s the group Adam Lambert, Danny Gokey and Anoop Desai are in, they don’t need to worry. The final room have now heard two rooms cheering. This is the room Tatiana was moved into and we’re being set up to think they’re going home. They’re so not, but the judges are doing their best to make them think that. Tatiana is pleading with god, but he’s on his way back to London (I don’t think he’s her biggest fan anyway) so she’ll get no help there. When they get the ‘yes’, Tatiana walks straight up to Paula without a glance at the other contestants. She may be annoying, but she’s smart.
My rating
There are some good contestants this year … I’m looking forward to seeing who’s in the top 36. I’ll be interested to see if any near the top of my list of those we saw in the round three show get cut by the judges tomorrow!
- Adam Lambert
- Mishavonna Henson
- Matt Giraud
- Ju’Not Joyner
- Anoop Desai
- Stephen Fowler
- Lil Rounds
- Danny Gokey
- Alexis Grace
- Kristen McNamara
- Nathaniel Marshall
- Laneshe Young
- Kendall Beard
- Scott MacIntyre
- Casey Carlson
- Kenny Hoffpauer
- Jorge Nunez
- Ann Marie Boskovich
- Nick Mitchell
- Stevie Wright
- Jasmine Murray
- Jamar Rogers
- Kai Kalama
- Kaylan Loyd
- Michael Sarver
- Tatiana Del Toro
- Joanna Pacitti
- India Morrison
