An American Idol Epilogue, Part 5
0 Comments Published by ginny on Monday, September 15, 2003 at 4:57 AM.
Section 11: In which I experience the longest and shortest three minutes of my life
Ryan interviewed Treyvon and his brother, who had come with him, briefly on the couch, while Lothario and I sat in the chairs next to it, and then Treyvon went in.
Treyvon went in. It happened just like that – very quickly, but it meant something momentous. It meant that I was next in that room. Out-of-body-experience feeling persisted. Could this possibly be true? Could I actually be less than four minutes away from the biggest audition of my life?
I moved to the standby chair. (Ryan did not interview me. In fact, this whole time there was very little footage of me, individually. While I was in the standby chair, one cameraman did film my knees as I jiggled them, nervously, but that's it.) And I sat there for both the longest and shortest three minutes of my life up to that point. Ryan wandered over and listened to Treyvon on the headphones. I could see him on the monitor, singing, and then listening to the judges, hands behind his back, as they assessed his performance, but I couldn't hear him.
Had he made it? It didn't look like it. He was walking out – he was out the door. He was talking to Ryan. He hadn't made it. "They told me," he said miserably, "that I should be a model."
I had time to look at him, to think "Oh, no, I wish he'd made it," and to think "But I don't have time to worry about Treyvon now, only about me" and then they were ushering me in the door, and then it shut behind me, and then, I was in.
Section 12: In which I am judged
It was bright in there. Very bright. Oddly enough, bright like a sunny day, not like a fully-lit stage, though because the room was windowless, they must have been illuminating it with stage lights.
Nonetheless, the impression was of having stepped from this grey, unreal shadow-world into the brilliant, sweet light of a spring morning. The sensation was compounded by the airiness of the room and the hushed, expectant whispers from producers to camera-people to crew to judges.
The feeling of being outside myself left me – I was here, this was real. This was more than real. This was it.
The room I had entered was an enormous ballroom of some sort – I couldn't tell how big – with a parquet floor. Several paces away from me, in the middle of the floor, was set up a soundstage, complete with its own flooring and walls on the front and back, surrounded by cameras. (It's set up to look as if the auditionees are in a fairly small room with the judges, when actually they're surrounded by a whole lot of space, containing other cameras, crew-people of various types, and a lot of empty space for sound to reverberate in.)
I couldn't see them from where I stood just inside the door, but I knew that sitting at a table against the "back wall" of the soundstage room were Randy (on the far left), Paula, and Simon.
"Over here," a producer said kindly, and pointed me towards the edge of the soundstage floor. "Good luck!"
My knees trembled a little as I walked – confidently, beautifully, I hoped – towards the stage. I entered on the upper right-hand side and walked to the middle. Randy, Paula and Simon were in front of me, and I could no longer see the cameras that surrounded the stage, only the three judges in their maroon chairs.
They looked…both as I'd expected and not as I'd expected. As with Ryan Seacrest, the effect of seeing these people in real life was somehow less…glittery…than I'd thought it would be. I mean, it was obviously them, but the glow the television cameras give them isn't quite the same in the real world.
What I mean is that they are so solid – so human – in real life, while when I see them on television it is as if they belong to a different species entirely from mine, made up of air and light and glamour; as if I almost think of them like fictional characters, constructs only of the moment and not of real life.
In terms of their mundane physical appearance, Randy may have lost some weight, but is not drastically thinner, as I'd heard he might be. (He looked nice, as always.) Paula has gotten a shorter haircut, which I didn't like as much as her last year's haircut, but which she may be growing out again, and may have gained just a little weight. And Simon was, well, Simon – clothed in a tight-fitting black t-shirt, groomed as he always is.
"Hi, how are you?" Randy said.
"Great, thanks!" I said, with a cheery, bright smile that I hoped would mask my nervousness. Appear cheerful! Appear likeable I reminded myself. "How are you all?"
"We're fine, thanks," Paula replied.
"So, you're Virginia," Randy said, "And you're…23 and from Roanoke, Virginia." He looked up at me and gave that professional smile of his.
"Yes I am!" I said. "Home of the world's largest mountaintop neon star, in case you'd like to know." I smiled broadly, hoping this would amuse them.
"Home of what?" Simon asked, making a face at me.
"The world's largest mountaintop neon star," I said. "It's a big star and it's on one of our mountains."
"Oh. Mountaintop," he said, as if I'd vastly annoyed him already.
"Yeah, see, we're the Star City of the South, and so…."
"So that makes you the star from the Star City, right?" Randy said, moving things along.
I laughed. "That's right!" I said. "I hope so, anyway!"
"So what do you do, Virginia?" Randy asked. Now, for some reason, this threw me briefly. Somehow for a moment it seemed as if he were asking me "do you sing or dance or what?"
"You mean, besides be a star?" I asked, decoding frantically in my head, but still smiling. (He means what's your job, doofus! Appear cheerful! Appear likeable!)
"Yes," Randy said – and now he seemed a little annoyed. (Though with Randy it can be hard to tell.)
"Oh, I'm a teacher's aide at an elementary school," I said. "I teach, um, LD kids."
"Very good," Randy said. "What are you going to sing for us, Virginia?"
"Heartbreak Hotel" I said, back on track.
"Ok, great," Randy said, and Simon nodded, and I stepped back, and I sang.
Now. How did I sing? I don't know, actually. I think I may have sung with a little less energy than I had the other two times, but I wasn't off-pitch or anything. My voice had, horribly, gone rough again, and for some reason I felt a little thrown the whole audition. Maybe it was just nerves, maybe it was having these famous people in front of me – I don't know what it was. Anyway, I think it is possible that it was not my best performance. But neither was it, by any means, my worst.
While I sang, Randy and Paula danced encouragingly in their seats, smiling back at me when I looked at them – this is, I think, part of what they do. Simon sat back with his arms folded tight against his chest.
A little before the end of the verse, Simon held up a hand and gestured dismissively, the other arm still folded across his chest. I stopped. (They had warned us we would be stopped. For that, I was prepared.)
"Virginia, Virginia," he said in a disbelieving, almost outraged tone.
"Yes?" I said, heart fluttering.
"Are you serious?!" he said.
Oh god, I thought. The worst had happened. Not only had he disliked my performance, but he thought I was bad enough that I couldn't possibly be serious about thinking I could sing. His face was twisted in an expression of disdain, maybe even disgust. But what had he heard that had so disgusted him? I hadn't thought I was that bad! I hadn't thought I was bad at all! Not great, maybe, but not horrible!
"I….I…think I'm serious," I said, laughing nervously. "I hope I'm serious."
"No," he said flatly. "I just saw that. You're not serious."
"Wh…what do you mean?" I faltered. "You mean my voice…or…or my performance style or my song choice or what?"
He looked exasperated. "Well, yeah, your voice and your performance style." He was totally disgusted with me for not understanding – and I still didn't get what he meant! How could I have been so bad…Did he mean that I'd been so bad? What was he talking about?
"Sing something else for us, dawg. Give us another song." Randy stepped in to facilitate – which seemed to be his primary role.
"Oh! Okay! Sure!" I said.
And now, crisis. See, I had read more than once that Simon hates it when people he thinks can't sing attempt Patsy Cline songs. But when choosing my second song, I'd still made the decision to go with I Fall to Pieces – thinking that, even if they didn't like me, I wouldn't be so actively horrible that they would think I couldn't sing at all, and knowing that that song shows off my voice very, very well. In other words, I decided to take the risk.
But now, it seemed that had been a bad decision. Because, apparently, Simon hated me. So much that he thought I couldn't possibly be serious about thinking I could sing. And it was going to make him hate me even more to sing a song by a singer he thinks only the best should attempt to emulate. Should I risk it still?
I had to. It just didn't make sense to go with anything else. The reasons I'd chosen Patsy Cline still held. I do sound good singing the song, and I know it. I had to try.
"Um," I said, "Well, I know this is going to annoy Simon….well," I said, smiling rumpledly, "he's already annoyed –"
"Why is he annoyed?" asked Paula, and now she seemed irritated! Oh god, another misjudgment! When would I stop saying the wrong thing?
I rushed forward. I had to. "But I'm going to try some Patsy Cline for you."
"Great! Wonderful!" Randy said. "Sing Patsy Cline."
And I sang. And this time – this time I did know how I was singing. And I was singing badly. Very. Badly. I thought so, anyway. As I sang, I heard note after note that I knew I could have done better, heard all the roughness in my voice, heard a desperation I didn't want to hear. Oh my god I thought, I am going to make the bad tape.
Simon stopped me again. And I knew he was going to say something terrible. I knew he was going to make fun of me. I hoped, at least, that I'd be able to maintain my composure. I hoped I wouldn't cry.
He leaned back and folded his arms again. "Well," he said, "I take back everything I just said."
What? I thought.
"You have a terrific voice. Fantastic voice. If you'd only taken this competition a little more seriously, you would have made it."
What? I thought.
"Yeah, dawg, you can really sing. You just didn't take it seriously enough," Randy said.
What? I thought. And then it hit me – they were making fun of me. I'd been so bad that not only were they not letting me through, they were ridiculing me by saying I had a good voice.
"I'm sorry," I said miserably. "It was bad."
"No, no," Randy said. "You're great – just not serious enough."
"Are you….Are you guys kidding me?" I said. I couldn't believe they were actually complimenting this performance I'd thought had been one of the worst of my life. And what on earth did they mean by "not serious enough?"
"No," Paula said, "Your voice is….I mean, you're almost too good for this competition."
"I mean, you're *this* close to making it to California," Randy said.
"I….I don't understand," I said. "What do you mean? I….I….let me try and perform something else for you," I said, desperately trying to understand. Not serious? They liked it? What did they mean?
"No," Randy said. "Come back next year and take it more seriously. You almost made it."
"I'd take it as a compliment," Paula said.
"I…..I….do," I said, still totally flabbergasted. "Thank you. Thank you very much."
And I walked off, wearing I’m sure, an expression of total bafflement.
Confused? Go to Part 6.
Labels: american idol, celebrity, trips, tv
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