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bout two weeks ago, People put out their annual American Idol cover story, titled "Idol Secrets! The finalists tell all!" This was quite a stretch, even for a magazine who wants us to think of Angelina Jolie as a humanitarian. We had been feasting on Idol secrets for months, as a string of controversies rolled out like a raw-meat buffet. Paula Abdul slurring her words on television interviews, contestants with criminal records, a former finalist accused of jacking off in front of staff . Antonella Barba, anyone? These days, the chatter at the water cooler isn't about Melinda Doolittle, a former backup singer with turbocharged pipes, or Blake Lewis, the beatboxer favored by Idol chat rooms. It is about the singular, runaway train that is Sanjaya Malakar — a high-school prank elevated into a nationwide phenomenon — and the question of when Ryan Seacrest and Simon Cowell are going to do it already.
Now, in its sixth season, American Idol is on the verge of being overwhelmed by the
sexuality and scandal it has tried so long to repress. If People magazine truly wished to feed our thirst for Idol trash, then how about answering these questions: What drug is Paula addicted to? Is Ryan gay? Is Sanjaya gay? Basically: Who's gay? Prurience is invading the American Idol mothership like Nissan product placement. This is quite a shift for the wholesome family show beloved by toddlers and their Nana alike. So what happened? Is American Idol the victim of its own popularity? Its own moralizing? I don't have the answer, but I do have a few theories. Maybe, at the end, you can vote for your favorite.
Theory 1: "Wholesome Family Entertainment" as Hopelessly Doomed
When American Idol began (humbly, without fanfare) in the summer of 2002, I doubt its British creators gave two shits about conservative family values. But as market capitalists looking for the biggest ratings share, they knew the appeal of a G-rated family show. Remember how tawdry television had become at the time? Fear Factor had just debuted. The Real World had permanently stumbled into threesome/binge-drinking territory. Sex and the City was at the height of its cultural importance. And American Idol was like the equivalent of a cruise ship cover band, offering soft-pedalled oldies, Broadway standards, '80s power ballads and jazz hands.
It was crucial to the show's ascendancy that scandal be kept to a minimum. As with Miss America, as with boy bands, as with early Britney Spears, the triumph of American Idol depended on its participants being seen as pure and virginal. As such, contestants were corseted tighter than eighteenth-century royalty. This was a show so bloodless and asexual that even Clay Aiken managed to seem straight.
When scandal inevitably hit in the second season — contestant Frenchie Davis had posed for topless photos! — American Idol rapped her wrists with a ruler and sent her packing. We can only imagine that the leash on the fabled Final Ten grew tighter. We can only imagine that lockboxes were placed on everyone's genitals. It's understandable that the Powers That Be wanted to keep these kids from sliding into sleaze. But as we know — from Miss America, from boy bands, from Britney Spears, from time immemorial — sexual repression is a formula for sexual explosion. And the harder American Idol tried to keep its collective pants zippered, the more the scandals leaked at the seams. Justin Guarini drunkenly riding a boat onto the shore? Clay Aiken barebacking with a stranger who saved the come rag? The more American Idol tried to project a squeaky-clean image, the more fucked-up the reality appeared.
Theory Two: They're Just Kids / Sometimes, Scandal Pays
And I, for one, don't blame anyone for cracking. Who knows what sweet hell those contestants endure? My guess is that the AI machine will eventually be reviled as the Joe Jackson of the twenty-first century — abusive, paranoid, and sociopathically selfish. At any rate, these kids sign their lives away to appear on that show. Meanwhile, they're the most talked-about personalities in the tween kingdom, which can only mean a skeleton key to the underpants of every mall rat in America.
But the current problem isn't how the contestants behave during the season; it's what happens before they get there. This year, the audition portion of the show — generally a parade of attention-starved, tone-deaf savants such as William Hung — was a contagion of tabloid scandal. A girl who placed sugar in her ex's tank. A guy with a record for drunk driving. And dear Antonella Barba — squatting provocatively on the toilet, holding a one-woman wet T-shirt contest in a World War II memorial fountain (!), covering her naked, nubile body in rose petals. This was an inevitability in the MySpace/YouTube era. But for the first time, the most interesting thing about American Idol wasn't what was happening on camera; it was what was happening online, as more and more photos of Barba emerged and chat rooms lit up with a dissection of her [cough-cough] talents. American Idol must have sensed the swell of interest in Barba, because unlike poor, shunned Frenchie Davis, Barba was allowed to stick around for weeks.
The sixth-season premiere of American Idol was the highest-rated show in its history. During the Antonella Barba scandal, it should go without saying, American Idol handily won its timeslot.
Theory Three: The Perils of Minor Fame and Being the No. 1 Show in America
The first major scandal to rock American Idol was Corey Clark's 2005 allegation that he had a prolonged sexual relationship with Paula Abdul. Following an official investigation and a hilariously overdramatic 60 Minutes episode, we all kind of came to the realization that Corey Clark was an opportunistic prick trying to promote his crappy album. It was hard to believe Abdul would sleep with such a loser, even under the influence of mason jars of Oxycontin.
But here is another problem for everyone on American Idol: They are sitting ducks for scandal. Basically anyone can say anything about them and make headlines. The tawdrier, the better. Meanwhile, you have former contestants grasping at their fifteen minutes with white knuckles. And so you can open a tabloid and find the headline, "Did Kellie Pickler get a boob job?" Or, "Did Constantine Have an Affair With Tara Conner?" Katherine McPhee, bulimia, blah blah blah. Hey, the pages of InTouch Weekly don't just fill themselves. Tabloids need minor stars with unpowerful publicists, minor stars unaccustomed to the spotlight (but craving it). Season one fifth-place finisher R.J. Helton made headlines by coming out earlier this year. And hey, it's no longer necessary to be a finalist in order to generate buzz. Booted contestant Olivia Mojica was barely a blip during season two, but that hasn't stopped her from putting out a sex tape, distributed by Vivid, called Hardcore Idol.
This year, no one got it worse than poor Clay Aiken, outed by Rosie O'Donnell on national television. (This after a minor gaffe on Regis & Kelly in which he placed his hand over Kelly Ripa's mouth. Ripa scolded him; O'Donnell bizarrely called her actions homophobic.) Am I alone in feeling sorry for the guy? He seems nice. He likes children and showtunes. I want to put my arm around him and tell him to come out when he's ready. I want him to know he's okay. I also want to teach him to use a goddamn condom, lest his cumrag be posted on the internet again.
Theory Four: This is America. And This is Your American Idol.
But for now, the real scandal is the vote-the-nerd-for-prom-king joke that is Sanjaya Malakar. Even my father has heard of the guy. What is going on here? Are twelve-year-olds text-messaging their fingers bloody? American Idol would like us to think so. Otherwise they would have to admit the show is being hijacked by websites like Votefortheworst.com and Howard Stern, who has been actively promoting Sanjaya on his show. Why? Because it's funny. Because it makes the show more entertaining. Because after six years of American Idol's ubiquity, it is more interesting to crash the mothership than to let it coast onward. And we can do that. We have the power. We can put the nails in the coffin, people. Granted, standard text-messaging rates do apply.
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| ABOUT THE AUTHOR: |
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Sarah Hepola has been a high-school teacher, a playwright, a film critic, a music editor and a travel columnist. Her work has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, The Guardian, Salon, and on NPR. She lives in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. |
©2007 Sarah Hepola
and Nerve.com.
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