Sunday, September 09, 2007 Covington: Sheer entertainment By Gary Covington Looking In
VARIETY shows -- I love them. For the skills on display, for the gasp of incredulity -- how did they do that? -- for the humor and for the sheer awfulness of the ill-advised amateur turn.
True variety was slowly throttled by the coming of popular television shows. Some live variety -- like the London Palladium where the Beatles might follow jugglers and a virtuoso xylophonist -- struggled on into the 1960s before calling it quits. Variety on the boards today is confined to small specialist theaters; the television version morphing into amateur talent displays which can be truly dreadful -- witness the wannabe singers on our weekend lunchtime shows. RPN though have turned up a winner -- broadcast on Sunday evenings -- a marvelous example of variety called America's Got Talent.
The format follows that of American Idol -- no surprise there as the show is produced by Simon Cowell, the Idol Brit panelist we all love to hate. There's a million dollar prize to the act which ultimately makes it to the top of the bill, a lively audience and a judging panel of three.
The judges have been carefully selected. A dash of glamour in the center seat keeping the peace between an acerbic Brit on the left and a Made in America celebrity on the right.
The glamour is the delectable and dusky Brandy Norwood, a chanteuse of no mean repute. The bad guy -- no doubt a pal of Simon Cowell -- is Piers Morgan. I'd never heard of him, had to look him up, and he's an ex-scribbler, formerly editor of the British newspapers the Daily Mirror and the News of the World. Good guy is David Hasselhof of Baywatch and that strange series featuring a talking car. David doesn't change at all; still trim, still with the jeans and cut-off jacket and still no shrinking violet when comes to exchanging gay repartee with the audience.
The first show was, I think, a couple of Sundays ago. I think because thanks to RPN's policy of announcing new shows and schedule shifts a day in arrears I've not yet caught a full show. My notes for that first Sunday have gone adrift -- senior moment -- but the line-up of acts went something like this: A dancing cow. An impressionist and a ventriloquist. A gospel singer. Two jugglers. A rapping granny. A parrot mimicking ringtones and a guy playing a nose flute.
See? You're smirking already. A dancing cow? A rapping granny? Granny actually bore away the cake. Gray haired, wire-rimmed spectacles, as meek as meek can be until the band struck up and then off she went -- doing the hand stuff, yo bro'ing, the moves, Snoop Dog may as well chuck it in now. The audience was on its feet, the jury in fits and me, well, I was rolling about on the floor, tears of mirth streaming down my cheeks. That's what variety is all about. Sheer entertainment.
Last Sunday's edition of America etc. was just as good. A singing duo -- terrible singing, frantic harmonica playing. A lady contortionist cum archer who, while bending over backwards with one foot up her nose, shot rubber-suckered arrows at a target and bulls-eyed every time. An Elvis impersonator -- booed off the stage. A juggler. A comic. A dance troupe performing a jazzed up lederhosen thigh-slapping routine. A quick change duo -- amazing -- and, finally, an eleven-year old yodeler.
Yodelers don't come by the dozen. Not four feet tall wearing a pink gingham dress and pigtails they don't. She was superb. Skipping about the stage yodeling to the stalls and then yodeling to the balcony. The audience loved her. Thunderous applause. She made her bob and danced off to mom waiting in the green room.
Variety -- amateur variety -- doesn't suit everyone but give America's Got Talent a whirl. Marvel at the skills, the nerve of the people who dare tread the boards in front of a live audience. Hiss and boo and laugh and cheer. The show's at around 7:30 on a Sunday evening and -- just in passing -- RPN's Sunday Last Full Show movie is now on a Saturday. Yes I did miss it and no, I don't know what time.
