America's Got Talent? Damned Straight!
So, back in January I got an e-mail which stated:
“I'm a producer with the NBC talent show "America's Got Talent" and I am currently searching for acts for our upcoming showcase in San Francisco. I came across your website and think you could be a fantastic fit for the show and would love to chat with you more about our auditions, how they work, what you do, etc. I think your act is fascinating and extremely interesting.”
It sounded… well… kind of dubious, and I halfway expected that if I’d answered the e-mail I would be instructed to give out my bank account info, or to fork over a $1,000 ‘application fee’ via cash left in a paper bag in a phone booth. I tend to have a suspicious frame of mind. I called Eva, read her the e-mail and asked if it was legit.
She said that it kind of was but kind of wasn’t. She told me about how they once held auditions in New York, how all of her friends had gotten similar e-mails and how, while the auditions were indeed real, many of her friends ended up being humiliated and insulted. She said that if I did decide to respond to the e-mail, that I should know what I was in for.
I was pretty unfamiliar with ‘America’s Got Talent’; the only thing I knew about it was that its British counterpart was responsible for Susan Boyle’s career, so I did a bit of internet research. I read up about the secrets of the audition process. I read about how during the auditions, they tended to choose people on the high end and low end of the scale; people who could legitimately win, and people who they thought were god-awful, who they could take delight in tearing apart on TV. The articles went on to say that everyone in the ‘awful’ category always seemed completely unaware that they may have been chosen as fodder for mockery.
Reading that I knew - I just KNEW that if I was going to be chosen at all, it would be for that latter category. My only hope of getting picked in an NBC audition would be as the ‘William Hung’ of the show. Bearing this in mind, I simply ignored the e-mail.
Apparently, the auditions were held yesterday, as evidenced by the number of people on my Facebook that were talking about them. For a second I had a slight twinge of regret that I hadn’t responded, but then I remembered - people in the ‘awful’ category have NO IDEA they’re in the awful category. I’m not always known for my self-awareness, but I’m trying to be better about walking into traps.
I want to make something absolutely clear; the people on my friends list who auditioned are people who I could not possibly imagine being in the ‘awful’ category. They are all amazingly talented singers, musicians and choreographers and any show should be falling all over itself to broadcast their work. But I also know what I am - I’m a puppeteer. I’m a geek thing that’s commonly mistaken for a Goth thing. If there are two things that would be easy fodder to tear apart on TV, it’s geeks and Goths.
But I do want to say just one thing for anyone who did audition - no matter what happens you do indeed have talent. America DOES have talent, and San Francisco has some of the best talent in all of America, but I suspect that NBC wouldn’t be interested in a fraction of it. San Francisco’s talent is in its dive bars and burlesque shows. Its talent is busy performing on street corners and BART stations. Its talent is in the people we talk to and meet and work with each and every day.
True iconic talent doesn’t come from reality shows; it’s forged into endurance through natural creativity. Twenty years from now, nobody will remember Kris Allen but so long as there are college dorms, people will be hanging posters of Jim Morrison. The next generation of kids will only know Kelly Clarkson from a quick blurb on VH1 “I <3 the ‘00’s”, but there will always be kids picking up the guitar with the dream of being Jimi Hendrix. Tom Waits would be hung out to dry on ‘America’s Got Talent’, but people have been buying his records for almost forty years, and they’ll still be buying them when we’re colonizing Mars and Epitaph is beaming the discography straight into our brains.
So for those of you who auditioned, I hope you get picked and I hope it’s a fantastic experience for you. But even if you don’t get picked, always remember; you’re all fucking brilliant, and you’re all friggin rock stars to me.
America’s Got Talent? They’ll never know the half of it.
“I'm a producer with the NBC talent show "America's Got Talent" and I am currently searching for acts for our upcoming showcase in San Francisco. I came across your website and think you could be a fantastic fit for the show and would love to chat with you more about our auditions, how they work, what you do, etc. I think your act is fascinating and extremely interesting.”
It sounded… well… kind of dubious, and I halfway expected that if I’d answered the e-mail I would be instructed to give out my bank account info, or to fork over a $1,000 ‘application fee’ via cash left in a paper bag in a phone booth. I tend to have a suspicious frame of mind. I called Eva, read her the e-mail and asked if it was legit.
She said that it kind of was but kind of wasn’t. She told me about how they once held auditions in New York, how all of her friends had gotten similar e-mails and how, while the auditions were indeed real, many of her friends ended up being humiliated and insulted. She said that if I did decide to respond to the e-mail, that I should know what I was in for.
I was pretty unfamiliar with ‘America’s Got Talent’; the only thing I knew about it was that its British counterpart was responsible for Susan Boyle’s career, so I did a bit of internet research. I read up about the secrets of the audition process. I read about how during the auditions, they tended to choose people on the high end and low end of the scale; people who could legitimately win, and people who they thought were god-awful, who they could take delight in tearing apart on TV. The articles went on to say that everyone in the ‘awful’ category always seemed completely unaware that they may have been chosen as fodder for mockery.
Reading that I knew - I just KNEW that if I was going to be chosen at all, it would be for that latter category. My only hope of getting picked in an NBC audition would be as the ‘William Hung’ of the show. Bearing this in mind, I simply ignored the e-mail.
Apparently, the auditions were held yesterday, as evidenced by the number of people on my Facebook that were talking about them. For a second I had a slight twinge of regret that I hadn’t responded, but then I remembered - people in the ‘awful’ category have NO IDEA they’re in the awful category. I’m not always known for my self-awareness, but I’m trying to be better about walking into traps.
I want to make something absolutely clear; the people on my friends list who auditioned are people who I could not possibly imagine being in the ‘awful’ category. They are all amazingly talented singers, musicians and choreographers and any show should be falling all over itself to broadcast their work. But I also know what I am - I’m a puppeteer. I’m a geek thing that’s commonly mistaken for a Goth thing. If there are two things that would be easy fodder to tear apart on TV, it’s geeks and Goths.
But I do want to say just one thing for anyone who did audition - no matter what happens you do indeed have talent. America DOES have talent, and San Francisco has some of the best talent in all of America, but I suspect that NBC wouldn’t be interested in a fraction of it. San Francisco’s talent is in its dive bars and burlesque shows. Its talent is busy performing on street corners and BART stations. Its talent is in the people we talk to and meet and work with each and every day.
True iconic talent doesn’t come from reality shows; it’s forged into endurance through natural creativity. Twenty years from now, nobody will remember Kris Allen but so long as there are college dorms, people will be hanging posters of Jim Morrison. The next generation of kids will only know Kelly Clarkson from a quick blurb on VH1 “I <3 the ‘00’s”, but there will always be kids picking up the guitar with the dream of being Jimi Hendrix. Tom Waits would be hung out to dry on ‘America’s Got Talent’, but people have been buying his records for almost forty years, and they’ll still be buying them when we’re colonizing Mars and Epitaph is beaming the discography straight into our brains.
So for those of you who auditioned, I hope you get picked and I hope it’s a fantastic experience for you. But even if you don’t get picked, always remember; you’re all fucking brilliant, and you’re all friggin rock stars to me.
America’s Got Talent? They’ll never know the half of it.