Five for the singing tilt finals

By sheer coincidence, two singing tilts on TV both came up with their final five bets last Saturday –“The X-Factor” in the States and “Protégé” on GMA 7. Each competition’s surviving finalists literally sang for their lives – their professional career prospects, that is, and to an aspiring singing star who used to be an absolute nobody only three months ago, that is like being born again.

The “X-Factor” finals were particularly stressful, because the contestants’ competition was only part of the evening’s contentious drama. The tilt’s celebrity jurors and mentors were also in full competitive froth, putting their hard-earned reputations on the line as they fought to make sure that their personal bets would survive for at least one more week.

As the original group of 12 finalists were sequentially voted out, their respective mentors got on each other’s nerves – so, now that only five contenders remained in competition for the tilt’s huge pot of $5 million, their mentors had long lost their patience and were now lashing out at each other in fierce and sometimes ugly “take-no-prisoners” mode.

Packaging

Behaving true to form and as advertised, Simon Cowell was the super Grinch and Grouch of them all. He was particularly down on cojudge, Nicole Scherzinger, whose packaging of her bets’ numbers he describes as “silly.” Nicole has by now learned to give as well as she takes from Simon, so she occasionally hit him where he lived and breathed, as well.

In comparison, Simon appears to have made his peace with former adversary, Paula Abdul, but his pal, L.A. Reed, sometimes got on his bad and bitchy side. All in all, the four jurors and mentors put on quite a colorful and volatile sideshow, upstaging their wards’ less spectacular antics.

Indeed, the surviving contestants are so terrified of being eliminated that they conserve their energy and focus only on their performances. Let their mentors provide the “bloody” entertainment, must be what they’re grimly thinking.

Last Saturday, the five surviving finalists – Simon’s Melanie and Rachel, Nicole’s Josh, L.A.’s Marcus and Chris – sang two songs each, and Chris appeared to have the edge when he performed a song that he himself composed – to the studio audience’s great delight.

At the other end of the success barometer, it was 13-year-old Rachel Crowe who bit the dust, based on viewers’ votes. Being too young and vulnerable to take the stress and disappointment, she fell to her knees onstage and had a big meltdown.

Decision

This raised fears that the show’s decision to lower its age minimum could have been ill-advised. We’ll see if the minimum requirement is raised next season, as a result.

On “Protégé,” the wrangling and weeping has been less spectacularly bilious and bitchy (it’s not in our nature to let our bitterness and anger all hang out in public, is it?). But, the mentors involved have also had sour things to say about the competition, each other – and even the separate panel of judges. On the local tilt, the female bets clearly have the edge. Abangan ang susunod na laglagan!