American Idol: Tuesday Recap (5/23)

The Final Two’s final performances. Finally.

by Frank Pittarese

Seacrest greets us in the dark, like a poor man’s Rod Serling. He’s clean-shaven now, because his bosses at E! layed down the grooming law. Anyway, we’re told that Kat and Taylor are going to step out on stage for the most important night of their lives, barring, ya know, eventual weddings and childbirths. “They’ve got to impress 40 million of you at home, and it’s all in front of these guys here.” The lights go on to reveal the audience at the Kodak Theatre, wailing like banshees behind Seacrest, who has his back to them. This is American Idol, peanut.

Post-credits, the audience continues to howl. Mandy Moore applauds from the audience. Ben Stiller is there, too. This madness has been going on since January, Seacrest says, and gives a shout-out to the 3000-plus fans in the audience and the “two very nervous people” backstage: Taylor and Katharine. Cut to the Doublemint Twins themselves, sitting in makeup chairs.  

Introduction of the judges. Randy says it’s now or never. “They gotta lay it all on the line tonight, man.” Paula hopes the kids’ nerves are “excited, a little bit,” that they’re in good voice, and that they’ll pick the right song to sing. Simon suggests that each contestant prays the other one forgets the words. Not that Katharine’s ever done that.

Here’s how it works. Each contestant will sing three songs each, with three phone numbers each, and the phone lines will stay open for at least four hours (as opposed to the usual two). True enough. As of 1:10 a.m., Kat’s line was still busy (though that wasn’t the case all night). Seacrest says that Idol has had two girl/guy finales, and both times, the girl won. That’d be Kelly Clarkson and Carrie Underwood. Fantasia won, as well, in a girl/girl showdown with Diana DeGarmo. So out of four seasons so far, the girls have a slight edge. Do I dare hope?

Clipfest, played to the tune of ‘Don’t Stop Believing’ by Journey. Kat and Taylor at auditions. Kat “really, really, really, rea-lllly” wants to go far in the competition. A less fake, less cartoony version of Taylor is excited to be there. She auditioned in San Francisco. He auditioned in Vegas. And they were each assigned very hazardous duties. But American Idol took them away from all that. “I want my voice heard,” he said then. Simon asks why. “Because I got one.” That’s Taylor for you, a pillar of humility. He’s from Alabama, which gave us such “superstars” as Ruben Studdard and Bo Bice.

At his first audition, Taylor met with some opposition from Simon, who said that Paula and Randy would “not put him in the final group to be judged by the public.” As I recall, they wanted to push Taylor through to Hollywood, but Simon felt they were shining the kid on. “This ‘silver fox’ has won over the nation with his soulful spirit and contagious dance moves.” As Seacrest says this, we’re treated to multiple shots of Taylor pitching fits on stage and off. Wooo. Soul Patrol. You know the drill.

Katharine gets her ticket to Hollywood. She always dreamed of being on stage and performing in front of a million people. “Tonight, you turned into a star,” Simon says, after an early performance. Kat twirls around like Wonder Woman in various locales, full of what seems to be sincere joy at just being part of this whole experience.

“It’s girl versus boy. The west versus the south. McPheever versus the Soul Patrol.” Class versus ass.

Taylor won the coin toss and chose to go second, so Kat is up first.

Back from commerical, and Seacrest is in the audience, where it appears most of the ex-contestants are in attendance. I see Melissa McGhee, and Lisa Tucker, and Bucky Covington. Romper, stomper, bomper, boo. Seacrest sees Chris Daughtry, and they hug. “Good to see you, brother,” Seacrest says, because this has to play like a Guy Hug. He wanders over to Kat’s parents. Daddy isn’t crying—yet.

Katharine McPhee: Song 1. She’s singing ‘Black Horse and the Cherry Tree’ again. This time she isn’t on her knees, although the box-drum guys are back. She sounds okay, but her performance is less energetic than before. I don’t know if it’s nerves or what, but she’s not connecting with the song or the audience like she usually does. But again, she’s okay. Christina Applegate, currently starring in reruns of Married With Children, begrudgingly stands and ovates.

Judges. Randy, without much enthusiasm: “I actually think you sang it better this time than you did the first time.” Paula: “It was a fun opening, but I know there’s more of you and better of you in songs to come.” Kat has a look on her face like, what do you people want from me?!?  Still, she keeps smiling. Simon: “I’ll give that a good with a small ‘g’. I think the occasion tonight is actually bigger than that song.”

She fills time with Seacrest, chatting about the thousand roses in her dressing room. “Who’s the guy?” he wants to know. Ryan’s romance sensors aren’t very good, as we saw with last week’s Kellie Pickler/Ace Young interaction. The roses are from Kat’s fans.

Taylor Hicks: Song 1. He’s singing ‘Living for the City’ by Stevie Wonder. Did he sing this before? I don’t recall. Because he’s Taylor, he gets to start this song from the aisles, amidst some ex-Idolers, Soap Talk’s Ty Treadway, and the awesome Taye Diggs. He’s wearing a bright purple velvet jacket, fresh from Wonka's Chocolate Factory. The audience stands and carries on, like Elvis is walking amongst them. I hate them as much as a I hate Taylor. Props to the little boy sitting in front of Tori Spelling. He doesn’t get up, and looks at Taylor with a mix of boredom and contempt. I hope he becomes President someday. Taylor does what he does: dances grotesquely, squats, knee-walks, and makes Halloween-mask faces. If you find this entertaining, I’m happy for you. When he gets to the bridge (which consists mostly of “la-las”), he sounds like pasteurized ass, but the back-up singers do a good job of covering it up.

The audience loses their shit over him.

Judges. Randy: “I was worried, you picking Stevie Wonder, ‘cause Stevie’s the hardest thing in the world to sing…but you don’t care who sings it, you don’t care what it’s from…’cause you always will make it your own! America, that’s a hot one right there!” Taylor, in the thick of this, has already started wooing and Soul-Patrolling. Ya know, I’m not a bully. I never really understood the bully mentality. But Taylor brings something out in me. I’d like to just shove him into a wall or dump pig’s blood on him at the prom. The guy just gets under my skin with his arrogant, fake bullshit. Why is no one throwing tomatoes as his fat ass? Or spitballs. They could at least hoot, like those people did to Glenn Close at the end of Dangerous Liasons. Paula goes on about Taylor's dancing, which…what? Homeless people will dance better for a quarter. Paula loses her choreographer card right there. “Way to go!” she says. Simon, all smiles: “It was a great way to start the show…Round One to you” Taylor says his brother got him to audition for the show, then Soul-Patrols another hundred times.

Katharine McPhee: Song 2. She’s singing ‘Somewhere Over the Rainbow,’ just like last week. The judges loved it then. Paula said the song was Kat’s “element.” The performance is exactly what it was before: pitch-perfect and quite beautiful. I was worried, because sometimes Kat will oversing things, but she doesn’t this time. It’s great. The audience loves it. Papa McPhee weeps like a lady.

Judges. Randy was initially worried about the song choice. “I was like it’s a little anti-climactic, whatever, whatever…but check it out, man…you worked it out again. That was hot!” Paula babbles incoherently about Kat making every father cry and every little girl proud who wants to dream and aspire to be Katharine. “Congratulations. You owned it up there.” Simon: “Round 1, you got slaughtered…but I truly believe this was your best performance of the competition so far. You’re back in the game.”

Kat is giddy because her ear monitor didn’t work, but she was able to start on the right key (a big worry because she began the song acapella). She explains, a mile a minute, how it all works, all goofbally. “I started on the right key, yay!!” Adorable! Seacrest fiddles with the monitor, and you can see a big Band-Aid on his palm. Jack B. Nimble fell through a glass table yesterday. As my mother always says, tables are for glasses—not for asses.

Taylor Hicks: Song 2. It’s ‘Levon’ by Elton John. I can’t tear into him too badly here. He sounds fine, and because the song doesn’t call for any dancing, the tics and spasms are less numerous. Taylor still makes the sourpusses, but if you don’t look at him, it’s fine. The audience waves their arms in the air like morons. Shit like that will get you marked for sterilization when I’m King of the World.

Judges. Taylor is already wooing. Randy: “Nice song. To be honest…gotta keep it real…it was a little pitchy for me this time.” Paula to Randy: “Maybe pitchy to you is the essence of who Taylor is.” The woman is deranged. Simon: “That doesn’t make any sense, what you just said.” He goes on, addressing Taylor. “If you walked the first round, I think Katharine has taken the second round.”

Seacrest calls for peace amongst the judges. Taylor shakes a fist in the air and Soul Patrols some more, because clearly it’s an endearing trait that we can’t get enough of.

Katharine McPhee: Song 3. This is Kat’s “debut single,” meaning that if she wins, this is what we’ll hear on the radio first. I don’t know what happens if she doesn’t win. Will it be released anyway? Will Taylor record it? Will it go into the Disney Vault? Who knows. Her parents clip-interview that Kat was always singing as a child. Her mom thinks it’s what Kat was born to do.

Kat looks elegant in a snug, formal gray dress. The song is ‘My Destiny.’ What’s it sound like? Take the faux-inspirational lyrics of Kelly Clarkson’s debut single ‘A Moment Like This,’ and mix ‘em up with a whisk. Then take the tempo and cut it in half. Add a pinch of bland and a teaspoon of indifference, bake for three minutes, and there you have it. ‘My Destiny.’ Lame, middle-of-the-road, generic, all-ages pop. The key seems too low for Kat’s voice, and it doesn’t feel like she can build any steam behind it. The melody forces her to hold back, and the result is, to me, a shaky, pitchy performance. Maybe this will sound better on CD, but live, for Kat, it doesn’t work. She gets to belt a little bit at the end, when a gospel choir—or perhaps the graduating class of Beverly Hills High—takes the stage, but it never really comes together. Do I still want her to win? Of course!

Judges. Randy: “I got three things for you…you look amazing…you sounded really good…I did not love the song.” Kat’s like, “Oh, okay.” Because she didn’t write that crap, so what does she care? Paula backs her up. “You are brilliant.” Simon: “You went from brilliant to quite good with one song…I’m delighted that you’re in this final, and I would say to everyone who wanted to vote…remember the second song.” When I voted, I just remembered that I hated Taylor. Try it, it works.

Taylor Hicks: Song 3. Taylor’s dad clip-interviews that Young Taylor would call him into his room, where Taylor would play music, then mimic it on his harmonica. As we know, Taylor is an excellent mimic—he’s been doing Joe Cocker since January—so this is no surprise. Father Hicks had a feeling that wouldn’t be the last time he’d see something like this from Taylor.

Taylor’s song is called ‘Do I Make You Proud.’ In previous seasons, the Final Two each sang the same song. It made it easier to compare the two, and factored into the vote. This split song business…I dunno. Anyway, it’s a little less mundane than Kat’s single, but again, it’s another crappy Song of Inspiration (“Now I can see/and I believe/it’s only just beginning/This is what we dream about…”). The Gosplers are back, and Taylor gets to work a few good power notes in there. Song-wise, it’s the less offensive of the two. At least it builds to something quickly, even if that something is akin to the theme tune for Star Trek: Enterprise. And vocally, Taylor does a better job with his single than Kat did with hers (although I think she’d have ruled on this, had she been given the chance). Is this another case of Taylor being “helped along”? Who knows. There’s no indication given of whether they chose these songs or were assigned them. I suspect it’s the latter.

Within two seconds of the last note passing his lips, Taylor vomits up five hundred pounds of “Soul Patrol” onto the stage. He can’t help himself, and I immediately go from having a minimal amount of tolerance for the guy into feeling pure, blinding hate all over again. He’s an asshole.

Judges. Randy: “You know who Taylor Hicks is. And no matter what the song is, you know how to make it into a Taylor Hicks vehicle.” Audience? Bugshit. Paula: “What I love about you is that you know who you are as an artist. All your riffs, all the nuances of Taylor Hicks, exist in that song no matter what it is.” Taylor: “Thank you! Soul Patrol!” See?!? Simon: “Assuming that I was right that the show was tied, then you have just won American Idol.” Taylor woos, because that’s all he knows how to do, then Seacrest encourages him to woo more. Ryan, please don’t make me hate you, too. Taylor woos and Soul-Patrols even more! I wish rabid dobermans would rush the stage and eat him alive.

Special guest-star Daniel Powter plays us out, live and in-person, with “the anthem for this year,” a dreary little song called ‘Bad Day.’ Clips from the season play on the screen behind him, but my DVR gets hungry for Veronica Mars and cuts the show off at that point. Good DVR. You get a Scooby-snack.

Be here tomorrow for the big, bloated finale when Taylor Hicks wins. I’d like to think that Kat will absorb some of Elliott’s votes, and that the Taylor-haters will vote against him, but I also like to think that someday alien ships will hover over our cities and life will become a Roland Emmerich film. That's probably more likely than Kat winning.

On the plus side, as of 3:30 a.m., Kat’s lines are still busy. Keep hope alive!