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Sector7G
Joined: 24 May 2008
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 Posted: Thu Apr 16, 2009 6:56 am Post subject: |
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delete post
Last edited by Sector7G on Thu Apr 16, 2009 4:33 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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Privateer
Joined: 31 Aug 2005
Location: Easy Street.
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| Posted: Thu Apr 16, 2009 7:37 am Post subject: |
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| Big_Bird wrote: |
Just spotted this article about it:
It wasn't singer Susan Boyle who was ugly on Britain's Got Talent so much as our reaction to her
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Is Susan Boyle ugly? Or are we? On Saturday night she stood on the stage in Britain's Got Talent; small and rather chubby, with a squashed face, unruly teeth and unkempt hair. She wore a gold lace dress, which made her look like a piece of pork sitting on a doily. Interviewed by Ant and Dec beforehand, she told them that she is unemployed, single, lives with a cat called Pebbles and has never been kissed. Susan then walked out to chatter, giggling, and a long and unpleasant wolf whistle.
Why are we so shocked when "ugly" women can do things, rather than sitting at home weeping and wishing they were somebody else? Men are allowed to be ugly and talented. Alan Sugar looks like a burst bag of flour. Gordon Ramsay has a dried-up riverbed for a face. Justin Lee Collins looks like Cousin It from The Addams Family. Graham Norton is a baboon in mascara. I could go on. But a woman has to have the bright, empty beauty of a toy - or get off the screen. We don't want to look at you. Except on the news, where you can weep because some awful personal tragedy has befallen you.
Simon Cowell, now buffed to the sheen of an ornamental pebble, asked this strange creature, this alien, how old she was. "I'm nearly 47," she said. Simon rolled his eyes until they threatened to roll out of his head, down the aisle and out into street. "But that's only one side of me," Susan added, and wiggled her hips. The camera cut to the other male judge, Piers Morgan, who winced. Didn't Susan know she was not supposed to be sexual? The audience's reaction was equally disgusting. They giggled with embarrassment, and when Susan said she wanted to be a professional singer, the camera spun to a young girl, who seemed to be at least half mascara.
She gave an "As if!" squeak and smirked. Amanda Holden, the female judge, a woman with improbably raised eyebrows and snail trails of Botox over her perfectly smooth face, chose neutrality. And then Susan sang. She stood with her feet apart, like a Scottish Edith Piaf, and very slowly began to sing Les Miserables' I Dreamed A Dream. It was wonderful.
The judges were astonished. They gasped, they gaped, they clapped. They looked almost ashamed. I was briefly worried that Simon might stab himself with a pencil, and mutter, "Et tu, Piers, for we have wronged Susan in thinking that because she is a munter, she is entirely useless." How could they have misjudged her, they gesticulated. But how could they not? No makeup? Bad teeth? Funny hair? Is she insane, this sad little Scottish spinster, beloved only of Pebbles the Cat?
When Susan had finished singing, and Piers had finished gasping, he said this. It was a comment of incredible spite. "When you stood there with that cheeky grin and said, 'I want to be like Elaine Paige', everyone was laughing at you. No one is laughing now." And it was over to Amanda Holden, a woman most notable for playing a psychotic hairdresser in the Manchester hair-extensions saga Cutting It. "I am so thrilled," said Amanda, "because I know that everybody was against you." "Everybody was against you," she said, as if Susan might have been hanged for her presumption. Why? Can't "ugly" people dream, you flat-packed, hair-ironed, over-plucked monstrous fool?
I know what you will say. You will say that Paul Potts, the fat opera singer with the equally squashed face who won Britain's Got Talent in 2007, had just as hard a time at his first audition. I looked it up on YouTube. He did not. "I wasn't expecting that," said Simon to Paul. "Neither was I," said Amanda. "You have an incredible voice," said Piers. And that was it. No laughter, or invitations to paranoia, or mocking wolf-whistles, or smirking, or derision.
We see this all the time in popular culture. Do you ever stare at the TV and wonder where the next generation of Judi Denchs and Juliet Stevensons have gone? Have they fallen down a Rada wormhole? Yes. They're not there, because they aren't pretty enough to get airtime. This lust for homogeneity in female beauty means that when someone who doesn't resemble a diagram in a plastic surgeon's office steps up to the microphone, people fall about and treat us to despicable sub-John Gielgud gestures of amazement.
Susan will probably win Britain's Got Talent. She will be the little munter that could sing, served up for the British public every Saturday night. Look! It's "ugly"! It sings! And I know that we think that this will make us better people. But Susan Boyle will be the freakish exception that makes the rule. By raising this Susan up, we will forgive ourselves for grinding every other Susan into the dust. It will be a very partial and poisoned redemption. Because Britain's Got Malice. Sing, Susan, sing - to an ugly crowd that doesn't deserve you. |
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I think it was a bit rude of the judges to say "everyone was laughing at you" (although Simon didn't say anything like that); it would have been better to just say they were bowled over and leave it at that. This article is almost as bad to dwell on it so much.
Anyway, nice to see some real talent on 'Britain's Got Talent'. |
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Big_Bird
Joined: 31 Jan 2003
Location: Sometimes here sometimes there...
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InFlames
Joined: 12 Apr 2009
Location: Toronto, Canada
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| Posted: Thu Apr 16, 2009 5:37 pm Post subject: |
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| I really liked that video because I felt like someone like her deserved the attention, and it wasn't just pity-attention: she actually has a great voice! Given some professional training I think she could be spectacular, and the way she emits emotions is something that comes from within. Guess I'm a bit biased since most of my family is Scottish but I really did like her. |
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loggerhead007
Joined: 22 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Thu Apr 16, 2009 8:22 pm Post subject: |
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Now I can watch those "Idol" shows. I've always hated the fact your looks mattered more than your vour voice. I'm over 50 and that's the way it used to be. You listened to music with your EARS and not your eyes. Can you imagine if her physical beauty matched her vocal beauty? A 20 on a 10 scale. Bring back real singers and players. I've been Milli Vanillied enough! Please...............
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Rteacher
Joined: 23 May 2005
Location: Western MA, USA
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| Posted: Thu Apr 16, 2009 8:24 pm Post subject: |
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My Korean high school students were really into the performances and reactions (by the crowd and judges) to Susan Boyle, Paul Potts - and even the Greek comedy dance act.
But it surprised me when several students even requested to hear Connie Talbot ...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QWNoiVrJDsE&feature=related
I wonder if she's gotten any coverage on Korean entertainment news broadcasts - highly unlikely - or if they just came across her story on the Internet... |
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loggerhead007
Joined: 22 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Thu Apr 16, 2009 11:04 pm Post subject: |
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| Coverage in image-land? I doubt it. This is short skirt, make-up, lip-sync central. The music I hear in K-land makes Brittany sound like Steve Vai. |
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seirogan
Joined: 19 Jan 2003
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ED209
Joined: 17 Oct 2006
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| Posted: Fri Apr 17, 2009 12:55 am Post subject: |
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| I'm sure they can drag her into the workshop, fix her teeth and hair, then through her back onto the stage looking a bit more suitable for a Royal Variety Performance. She wouldn't look too dissimilar to the average opera singer after a bit of work. Her pre-presentation was bad and the audience had probably seen a dozen so people like her fall flat on their faces totally humiliating themselves. She did well to win over an audience that is akin to the crowds of the coliseum. |
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seirogan
Joined: 19 Jan 2003
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OneWayTraffic
Joined: 14 Mar 2005
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| Posted: Sat Apr 18, 2009 3:09 pm Post subject: |
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| Sector7G wrote: |
| Jae_Sun_Kr wrote: |
| Same crap as the opera guy. Once was enough. Boring !!! |
Actually, it took me several viewings to get bored. I even showed it to several people who all were touched by it as well.
Still, I have to say, after comparing it to some of the other singers who did it, including the one I posted earlier, Susan Boyle's rendition is average at best. Now of course this in no way diminishes the heart-warming story, but in a funny twist, if she was a looker, I doubt we would even be discussing her. Because it's not really her voice we are discussing.
Ya know, I wouldn't even put it past Simon Cowell to have sought her out and planted her after he saw how big Paul Potts got. He ain't no fool when it comes to getting attention. |
It's a bit unfair to compare someone who's been singing professionally for years, who's received years of voice training, with someone who's been looking after her Mum all that time.
I'd say she's about as good as the average singer in the International cast of Les Miserables, and I've heard that song literally dozens of times. and that was the shock for me. I didn't expect her to be that good. Everybody on that cast has an incredible voice.
There's hundreds of people with beautiful voices, but it takes a good story to become an instant celebrity. She would have been able to go professional if she'd put in the time and hard work and taken all the risks, as do most of those who make it to broadway musicals. Looks don't matter that much for there's plenty of parts where they're looking for less than beautiful people. |
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OneWayTraffic
Joined: 14 Mar 2005
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| Posted: Sat Apr 18, 2009 3:22 pm Post subject: |
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| One more thought. She'll never be as successful as Elaine Paige. It's impossible to duplicate a lifetime of achievement in the few years she has before her voice goes. But she can certainly be successful enough to set up her financial future, and make a life and a name for herself. And that's what really matters. |
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blaseblasphemener
Joined: 01 Jun 2006
Location: There's a voice, keeps on calling me, down the road, that's where I'll always be
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| Posted: Sat Apr 18, 2009 5:18 pm Post subject: |
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Let's see her do another song, I thought her rendition was good for the first 10 seconds, then it was flat and low for most of the rest.
On a side note, Britain DEFINITELY has talent. I've seen much better acts on there from a kingdom of 60 million than from the U.S. version drawing from 300 mill.
Loved Stavros Flatley, Flawless, and the Michael Jackson & Turban Janitor act from last season. Something in the water there in Britin. |
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Neil
Joined: 02 Jan 2004
Location: Tokyo
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| Posted: Sat Apr 18, 2009 6:22 pm Post subject: |
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I found it nauseatingly patronizing. "Oh my God ! ... she's unattractive AND she can sing !!" Sure, she's got a good voice but it was hardly awe-inspiring was it ? If she was some nubile chanteuse out of central casting, anybody who wasn't actually watching at the time would be utterly oblivious to her.
Are we supposed to find it heart-warming that everybody assumed she'd be rubbish purely because of her physical appearance? Once she got the ovation, she should have given the panel the finger for all that horrible smirking at the start. It was nasty and deeply uncomfortable viewing.
No doubt she'll win to make Cowell and Morgan look slightly less shallow than they really are and then be shunned and forgotten. |
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Sector7G
Joined: 24 May 2008
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| Posted: Sat Apr 18, 2009 9:40 pm Post subject: |
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| Neil wrote: |
| Once she got the ovation, she should have given the panel the finger for all that horrible smirking at the start. |
Now that would have been great!!! |
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