AGT – Week 2 auditions!
The freaks and geeks and talented peeps are out in style once again as we try to discover if America, does indeed, have talent. As always, with the audition process, i remain ever doubtful of our ability to judge our own talents. Me, I *KNOW* I have no talent that doesn’t involve hiding behind a screen and tapping away on a keyboard. These guys? Not so much.
Take the first act, for instance. A 55 year old singing fairy that brags of her 3 and a half octave voice. And she sings Disney’s “When you wish upon a star” while dressed as a fairy, natch. And it wasn’t her decision to become a Fairy Singer, it chose her. I’m already cringing, and you think I’m kidding, right? Wrong. Brace yourself:
NS: Pop Goes Country.
This week, pop went country on Nashville Star – or at least that’s what was the hope. There were some hits and some misses, and some very odd song choices as is typical of this type of show, right? Right! So who shined, and who tarnished? Keep on reading!
We start off by finding out one of the final two right off the bat this week – and it’s the Judges sweetheart, Tommy Stanley the Navy boy. While he gets the chance to get real nervous about that, the top 10 acts preform Madonna’s “Like a Prayer, and Melissa Laswon starts it off incredibly before everyone else joins in. It kinda goes sour there, but it was pretty fun none the less. If Melissa is in the bottom two again this week I might have to hurt someone – she’s got some serious pipes!
The Mole: Selfish vs. Selfless
Who is the mole? No one knows. This episode, everyone is driven up to the Andes Mountains for the next mission where it’s cold and high altitude and they’re expecting physical activity. Paul introduces Mr. Lemonhead and says Lemon’s only have sour faces. Ha.
So Kelly greets our final 8 and Craig is already complaining about the cold. They separate into two groups – selfish (Victoria, Kristin, Nicole and Clay) and selfless (Alex, Craig, Mark, Paul). The mission is called Midas Rush. There’s 200 gold bricks that weigh 5 pounds each. There’s 250 bucks into the pot for each brick they carry up the mountain. Clay thinks he’s crazy. The whole team has to arrive at the same time to complete the mission. There is an exemption at stake for the winning team. Of course, the way Kelly worded it, they think it’s for the whole team – but is it? They have 50 minutes to complete.
The selfish team takes a minimal amount of bricks with exemption in their sights, while the selfless team takes as much gold as possible to get more money into the pot and they start walking. Nicole starts complaining right away saying she can’t do it and has to stop, and she tells us she wants to throw as much suspicion on her as possible so there’s less on the actual mole.
Craig’s team lets him pick the pace, and they stay together. He misses Bobby, because he feels he’s the weakest player. his teammates are encouraging though and they keep trucking on. They’re all feeling the altitude, and they see Kelly waiting and he says he forgot to tell them that they have to carry a scale too. One weighs 10 pounds, the other 20. The first team (Selfish) chooses their scale within touching it, and they grab the small one and go, picking the lighter scale. The Selfless team gets the heavy one and grab it and keep going. The Selfless team are funny, and working together, staying about 50 yards behind the other team. Craig is really struggling, but the team is true to the name and determined to finish together or not at all.
LBtM: Search for Elle Woods
Right off the bat, this week, the girls dump on Cassie for what she said to the judges last week about the girls letting her down. Cassie is unable to really defend herself, and is shocked at how they are lecturing her about taking things too personally and isolating herself from the group. They decide it’s best to let go and calm down, while they’ve left Cassie in tears. Girls are mean.
They head to the next workshop, where they get to bond with the dogs that play Elle’s Bruiser in the show, Boo-Boo and Teddy. They get a sleep over so that they have the chance to bond, and the next day they’ll be put through their paces in front of the trainers to see who managed to get the most out of their time together. They teach the girls the commands, and are told they have to make it believable – if Elle drags the dog around stage, the audience won’t believe they like dogs. The dogs take to Autumn and Lauren naturally, and Cassie S. has problems and is frustrated as she blames her trust issues.
In the end, Autumn wins the challenge, and takes Celina with her on her reward: a date with BoBoo and Teddy, and Richard Blake, who plays Waner in LB: The Musical. It’s a good reward, because the audition will have the girls singing “Serious” with Richard – it’s the breakup scene, and has both comedic and tragic moments, so will really test the girls in all areas.
Meanwhile, Emma heads to the doctor and discovers she does have an infection due to quiting smoking, and she worries that her performance is going to suffer. No one really does outstandingly well – except Emma! So her worries were unfounded as she gets glowing remarks from the judges. The judges find the challenge telling, and it’s easier to make their decision as they have Autumn, Cassie S. and Celina go to face them for elimination.
Paul says Cassie would be a better understudy, and she says she won’t do it, she’ll be a star. They also can’t see Celina as Elle, and Autumn blames her performance on a bad day, getting her a lecture about consistency. Bernie cuts Celina, then tells the other two that another is going home as well, and then cuts Cassie, giving Autumn another chance to be consistent.
Next Food Network "star" 4.4
I didn’t see last week’s show, where the contestants nearly wet themselves because they met Martha Stewart. They prepared their own product to market to stores, and Nipa swiped all the cayenne pepper. They presented to 50 food buyers, but in the end, they send Jeffrey home for being too one dimensional with his salt mixture.
This week the contestants have to jump right into the fray as they’re given 60 seconds to create a technique video of food preparation by guest Tyler Florence. They had all sorts of things to use, but many cracked under the time constraint. Kelsey tried to dial it back a bit as the judges keep nagging her about it, and the work paid off as she won the challenge and got her video shown on the Food Network’s front page.
My favorite Food Network guy, Michael Simon, the inner of AMerica’s Next Iron Chef, was the guest member of the selection committee this week, along with Michael LaDuke, from Red Lobster. The winner of the night’s challenge gets to have their dish featured on the Red Lobster menu nationwide. They have too cook for 30 Coast Guard men and women on one of their ships, and will be judged on food and presentation,a s always. Jennifer keeps apologizing for her food and presentations, and I don’t think she possibly can win this because of it. She needs a shot of confidence, that one. Lisa slips and spills soup all over herself, but recovers beautifully and impresses everyone, but it’s Kelsey who is declared the best of the night and wins the challenge.
Jennifer, Nipa, Adam and Aaron are in the bottom four, and they give Jen another chance to gain some confidence, and finally decide that Nipa has to go. She didn’t want to be there, anyway, and says as much in her exit interview. She was far to cocky and know-it-all for this competition, for sure. Bye bye Nipa!
