Paris Bennett is, yes, dressed like British Airways or a character from A Clockwork Orange. That's so Song! She's still got her dominatrix weave in from last week. She squeaks at Ryan about how she had a great weekend, Easter rocked as usual, she got a little basket from her mom (who was silently weeping as she delivered it), and she went dancing with friends, and also roller-skating. Hold up -- dancing? On Easter Weekend? Thank Mandisa that Mandisa's gone or She'd probably give her a swirlie, because Mandisa knows what's best for us all. Ryan tells her that "Simon dressed up in a bunny costume and laid eggs at my house on Sunday," and Simon's like, "Huh?" and Paris is like, "I've been around the block but I don't understand your terminology. Is that like poodle-balling?" Paris says she loves the songbook, of course, because if she doesn't give tribute to the fifteen dead women whose souls reside in her hairpieces once a month, they'll take away her magical voice and she'll instantly grow to be the actual 50 years old that she chronologically is. Rod Stewart figured out -- based on the voice alone -- that Paris has a jazz background. He should be a detective! He says that she's got "a touch of Billie" about her, and for a second I'm confused, but he explains he means Billie Holliday. Whew. This is so embarrassing, because first I thought he meant Billy Barty, and I was like, "I can see that," but really that would be more for Kevin, and then I thought "maybe Billie Jean King?" but no, that's Ayla of course, but so then I realized that he was talking about Billie Holliday, to whom she bears an obvious, yet always startling, resemblance in terms of vocals, looks, and phrasing. My bad. In her session with Rod Stewart, her mom was there, and Paris pretty much cops to the strange fact that her mother just follows her from location to location weeping silently, and says basically: "They are tears of joy, for I am wondrous." Rod Stewart says she has "raw emotion" and that she's a little wonder at 17, because -- he jokes -- he was still "digging graves" at 17. The British have the most unappealing sexual euphemisms. Especially about older women.
Paris sings "Foolish Things" with oh! such a knowing look in her eye. The only thing I know about this song is that it gets you drowned in comic books. That's all I know. The performance is actually pretty fantastic -- last week I loved her, but, like, not as a singer. Like, as a Visigoth. But this week, it's fucking remarkable. I'm so glad she's off the Seal for this week. Her dancing is a little robotic, but she looks and sounds like a billion tax-free dollars and basically, these standards are what she needs to do for the rest of her life. Norah Jones, as I always say, can go fuck herself, but whether or not she does, Paris is queen. Just Lady Day all the time. (Minus the heroin!) I bet if you were in the audience, you got chills. How perfectly awesome. Randy calls it her "best night ever," "brilliant," and "so the bomb!" Paula says it was reminiscent of auditions, which: exactly. She's come close before to hitting that thing that made her so amazing in auditions, but she nailed it this week. Paula's actually quite eloquent on the subject of Paris, if slightly idle and poetic, all about how she was seemingly "born in that era" and ought to make a record. Simon says that she talks like Minnie Mouse but sings like a lady, and he prefers the singing side of her. Paula awwwwws, but he tells Paris it was terrific and she thanks him sweetly, and squeakily. Ryan runs up to the judges' table and Simon very cutely and warmly whisks his glass out of Ryan's reach, because of what happens when the water sports start, and Ryan says he just wants to smell it, and it's dorky and overmuch, and as he nears the stage he dorks out, "Simon is sipping the happy fuel, ladies and gentlemen," and he seems so, so lonely sometimes, and I wonder why it's Simon that always makes him act so dorky and young and ahead of himself. Like Oprah and a cookie sheet of nachos are just a show-cancellation away. When you think about that shit, does it make you want to hug Ryan? It makes me want to hold his hand and tell him he's the best boy in the whole world. Again, though, somebody has to explain Ryan's comments to Simon. Ryan just loves Paris, and says after the break, Taylor Hicks, and Taylor Hicks comes into frame and immediately dips low to his left with that stupid fake baby-smile, and I guess it's going to be one of those nights with him.
“ I didn't make this up -- Simon's head goes thunking down onto the table in front of him during a particularly bad part of the song, which we'll just call for brevity's sake 'the song,' and there are actually just fucked-up notes, nothing 'pitchy' or 'sharpish' or 'flatogonal' about it: just WRONG, these notes. ”
And he buys her a pre-owned Kia Sephia, because that was the deal. So the song starts pretty nasal, but that's kind of how the song is anyway, and you know what? Kellie Pickler looks kind of pretty. In the face. She's got some twang happening which adds a little bit of interesting texture to the song, and her dress is simple, but it makes her ass look fantastic, which is always fun. From the front, she looks like a hot mess and here's why. The skirt is not tailored at all from her hips, so it just goes straight down. I don't even think there's a hem, just trailies and a weird stopping point just below her knees. She looks like a skinny girl in the middle of a magic trick where her bottom half is imperiled inside a box. It's pink satin-like fabric, a gorgeous color on her, and here's what I think happened: she bought some pink satin sheets at Frederick's Of Hollywood because she's never had money before, and she thought they were very classy and shiny, and she slept on them for awhile. But then one day, after the stylists drove her out to the woods and left her there for being an idiot, she knew she'd have to dress herself from now on, so she cut those sheets up just like Molly Ringwald, and made this very cute dress, but didn't have time to hem or tailor the bottom half, and that's why she looks like she should have a baby on each arm and a basket full of "the washin'" on her hip. I stress that this is only a theory. So while I'm daydreaming about who her personal Duckie would be -- I'm thinking Ace, because you know Duckie ended up gay -- her singing is getting worse, and worse, and worse, and she's getting further and further ahead of the music, and there are these great HONKING noises coming out of her, and some weird hissing, and at one point, confused, she starts humping the air like it's last week, and all of the oxygen is sucked out of the studio, and -- I didn't make this up -- Simon's head goes thunking down onto the table in front of him during a particularly bad part of the song, which we'll just call for brevity's sake "the song," and there are actually just fucked-up notes, nothing "pitchy" or "sharpish" or "flatogonal" about it: just WRONG, these notes, and she goes too fast and slows down, and modulates up like an entire half-step and then back down the other way, like a queasy ferry-boat slowly sinking, and it's terrifying. I don't want to see Kellie Pickler do poorly, if for no other reason than that life clearly already hates her.
Randy's like, "Um, yeah. You know what I'm going to say." And she laughs, and it's pretty pathetic and I do sympathize: "Ah burtchered it! Awwwwugh!" She keeps making these hilarious Lucy Arnaz noises the whole time. Randy goes down the buffet, "It was...pitchy? A hard song to sing? Not a great song choice?" and then heads back to the beginning of the buffet once more: "It was pitchy in spots?" Paula ignores everything and says she has to "give it up for the fashion." Randy, seeing the easy and kind way out, mentions her very sparkly, Bedazzled shoes. Paula says she liked the beginning, that it was very vulnerable, and I'll give her that: looking back, it was not the bad part. She says that the camera loves Kellie's face (LIE) and that she can't wait for Kellie's acting career to begin (TOO LATE). She mentions Kellie getting ahead of the music, and again: I'm very impressed with old Paula tonight. Apropos of the conversation they were having nearly a minute ago, Kellie bursts out, "When all else fails you gotta have great shoes, right?" And there is "Woo!" but only with half a heart in it. Simon says it was like she didn't pick the song herself, and adds that you could shorten the song title to "Bewildered." Which, I mean, that would be the theme song of Kellie's entire life. She makes a sad, fake-ish frowny face, and apologizes for her immense sucking. "Wasn't great. I agree." Ryan swoops in to save the day -- pointing out, and this is super-sweet, that she "nailed it" in rehearsal -- and she makes a lot more Lucy noises at him, but admits that her nerves got to her, and that she could hear herself get ahead of the song. Ryan kids around with her about how they're live so you can't ask for a do-over, and she replies, "I won't put you through the torture." I don't know who awwwww'd louder at that, me or Paula. Because my God, this poor girl with her stupid self and her shitty singing and her tacky dress. She makes sad faces and brave smiles into the camera, and Ryan says, "When we come back: Ace, live." I say, "Kinda," and then we get a shot of Ace Young in what he'll be wearing tonight, and he looks like that guy from Italy that Carmela wanted to bang, only creepier, and he looks like the biggest joke in the universe, and this is going to...rock.
Ahem. Simon says it wasn't that bad, and everybody cheers like he just said Ace deserved to live. He notes for the first time that Ace's voice can get "a little nasal," but said it was "charming." I have never felt quite so confident in a prediction as this: tonight, Simon will "watch it back," and in the morning he will repent, and beg our forgiveness. Because it was not charming, it was crap. Consistent crap from a consistent crap-producer, but crap nonetheless. Ryan wigs about that, because God forbid Simon be nicer to his Ace than he is, so he's gotta climb aboard the love train, and then asks if "that hairstyle" hurts. Ace lets us all know that he didn't cut the hair, just slicked it back so he'd look like a fucking fuck-up for some reason, and we get a close-up: it's not a bun, but actually a teeny-tiny ratty stupid-looking ponytail. Like on a porn director or serial rapist. ["Because it was too high up on his head. If you're going to have a ponytail, dudes of the world, gather it low. This isn't field-hockey practice at Sacred Heart." -- Sars] Ryan -- having learned that Ace's hair is intact -- takes his knuckles out from between his teeth, and then interrupts Ace's non-stop babbling ("I've never received approval from a male authority figure in my life!") and kicks the numbers. Just get him off, off, off the screen, mister. : Katharine looking like Fabulous on an interview at Gorgeous Incorporated.
Katharine just loves famous people! She gets along with them so well because she is intensely professional! Who doesn't love a precocious drama queen years ahead of her time? Why, she has an old soul and a youthful demeanor, what more can you ask? Badunk? She's got that too. She just looooves meeting Rod Stewart, because every second that goes by is another opportunity to get approval from adults for what a superstar you are. They hug and they dance and they pants around, and she sings for him in a total DQ way, and she's so very at ease, because that's what she was bred to be, in a test tube, and he thinks she was "born to sing the standards," and in a way he's right, but I think what he means is "bred." They laugh and oh, the fun they have. He tosses out one of her selections because he's singing it tomorrow, and how they do laugh. He imagines "big things" for her, and has not much else to say, because she is fantastic. And she giggles. And Kat's giggles come from deep within her plastic heart.
The thing about precocity is that, as with fashion or anything else that's truly important, you're either in or you're out. Either you buy what the kid is selling, or you don't. Like how a movie can seem really meaningful and touching to you, and somebody else can call it crap, and then you've gotta make the call whether you're going to stay in your box or take a trip to theirs. Once called, Kat's bluff either sticks or not, but either way you've got to check it out from her perspective: is it really fake if it's all you know? If it's all you are? She and Chris are two peas in a pod, the only difference being which kind of fake you prefer. You know this word "simulacrum"? Like how when you picture a diner, like a '50s diner, we all agree basically on what that looks and feels like, but the reality of that, the dinerness of that, never existed, and the only ones you see are the fake ones built on the simulacrum of diners, and that's why they always seem too shiny, too neon, too Disneyland. Too Katharine.
“ But then at the end, the car gets to the red carpet event and everything's illuminated and there are fireworks, and it's unexpectedly touching, because they kind of are stars, against all odds, due to this show being like a twice-weekly Superbowl. ”
Simon says that she "made the others look like good amateurs," was in a "completely and utterly different league," and like I said above: that's why Simon and I tend to agree, because we don't care about quality, we care about salability, and all that "you're too fat to be the American Idol" stuff: you look at Kat, you smell money. And she smelled more like money than anybody tonight, even Paris. But because of the wild hyperbole and generally off-the-tracks way that all of this sounds, Paula wigs out and starts screaming over him, because she doesn't want him sabotaging Kat's chances by going too far with the praise: "And congratulations! And Rod Stewart gets a big kudos! Istanbul was Constantinople! How come Mickey Mouse has a friend who's a dog but also a pet who's a dog?" just this unending, undulating Congressional filibuster calculated to run Simon's time out. And I think she has a point, actually, but then I think he did too, so it's up to better minds than mine how the manipulation of this audience goes. Katharine thanks them graciously. Paula is really just very smart sometimes. Ryan points out that "Father McPhee" is in tears, but you can't see the nipple clamps Mother McPhee applied before the show because he's wearing loose flannel, and Kat thanks the screamers, and us. Well, me. Maybe you, I don't know for sure.
Wednesday
Tonight: a series of irritating things, and one thing that was so obvious, it's irritating. So let's just do it. Ryan's smile is the first thing you see, and it's particularly fake and tight tonight -- there's lots of "energy energy" in his voice and tone. Uh oh. He tells us how "the whole country is buzzing about the show," and why shouldn't they, because it was like the best episode ever. But he'll say that later. Paula looks very Botoxed tonight. And sad, so it's a guy. Add that to Ryan's weird energy, and you get: Ace. Remember last night, Rod Stewart with his alien bastard and that cool khaki/gold pinstriped suit that matched his highlights? Remember how Paula acted drunk and talked about "the magic"? How "the standards soared," and Elliott cringed and wrinkled around? And Chris was a new flavor of pointless? And Paris was wonderful and "bewildering"? And Kellie was repulsive to everybody but the voters? And Ace looked like a serial rapist and Simon called him "charming"? And called Taylor "magic," even though it was the magic of a k-hole? And how Ryan knew Simon was drunk and Katharine made her dad cry real tears? But really it was because his wife abuses him?
Pimpomercial: "Kids In America" is the song. A hideous Ford vehicle drives toward a red carpet event, passing billboards of the Idols as it goes. It starts out okay: "Taylor In Concert" jackassing it up as usual; "Elliott Live" dancing like an asshole but at least aware of the fact; "Kellie Summer Tour" in glamorous sunglasses and the wind flapping hair around, obscuring the butterface altogether; "Katharine Classics" singing the song beautifully and not really well-lip-synched; "Ace Greatest Hits" pretending he's a man and dancing like a go-go boy in a black tank top; "Chris In Concert" pretending to play the guitar; "Songs From Paris" being sung by a static Paris...and then everything goes nuts. Taylor starts flapping all over his billboard like David Byrne, Paris flopping quickly back and forth like a scary monster, Kellie's faceless self twitching, Elliott wiggling, everybody moving way too fast and making you very nervous. But then at the end, the car gets to the red carpet event and everything's illuminated and there are fireworks, and it's unexpectedly touching, because they kind of are stars, against all odds, due to this show being like a twice-weekly Superbowl. Ryan loved it, because he's the boy Kat and all he ever wanted was: that right there.