Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Idol & Broadway Backwards

I just finished watching tonight's American Idol (how weird does it feel writing that?!) and I'm glad to say that my guy, Adam Lambert, was sent through to the next round.

They showed more singing tonight (as opposed to a lot of pointless drama and very little singing last week when I watched) and Adam was featured more, singing first out of everyone. He did a version of Cher's song 'Believe', which I thought was really good. A lot of people seemed to be choosing songs that ten other people were also singing, so I liked that Adam went with something that no one else picked and really made it his own. He's got a beautiful voice.

They were dividing the contestants into rooms where everyone in the room would either go forward or be eliminated. I felt pretty confident that Adam's room was safe, given that everyone in the room seemed to have done really well, Adam included, but it was still a long wait before they gave them the good news.

I don't know how I'm going to deal with the tension of this show! I always thought it was kind of silly, but when there's someone you really want to see move forward, you truly are on the edge of your seat until you know if they're safe or not. Its ridiculous!

In the preview for tomorrow's show, they arranged the footage to make it look like Adam will be cut, but I'm hoping that's just another trick. It seems like they'd want to shock people at the last moment if he was being cut, rather than reveal it the day before in a preview.

It still feels odd to actually be watching American Idol, but I have to say that a lot of the people I saw tonight had really great voices.

Speaking of great voices, yet another reason that I want to live in New York is that I'd be able to attend shows like Broadway Backwards. If you haven't heard of this before, it's an annual benefit for NYC's LGBT Community Center in which male stars perform songs usually done by women, and vice versa.

I first heard of this last year, when Neil Patrick Harris and his partner, David Burtka, did their own version of Maureen & Joanne's song 'Take Me Or Leave Me' from Rent. I've seen clips from their performance on YouTube, but never the the whole thing. It looked so good, though, and to top that off, Cheyenne Jackson & Anthony Rapp did 'Suddenly Seymour' from Little Shop of Horrors!

What I wouldn't have given to actually be there that night!

Anyway, the reason I bring this up is that AfterElton has pictures from Broadway Backwards 4, which took place yesterday. It looks like it was another great show. I mean, you have Cheyenne Jackson and Sandra Bernhard performing 'You're the Top' together, Ugly Betty's Michael Urie and Becky Newton doing 'Getting Married Today' from Company, and Florence 'Mrs. Brady' Henderson groping a chorus boy! Whats not to love?

I really wish I could have seen this. If only they'd film these annual shows and sell the DVDs to benefit the Center! They'd make a ton of money that way and we poor non-New Yorkers would be able to enjoy the show, too.

Meanwhile, one of my best friends joked the other day, as I was enthusing over seeing Rent with Anthony Rapp and Adam Pascal next summer, that I'm in danger of becoming a theatre queen. Hmmm. I'm not sure where she got that impression!

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