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American Idol' becomes tie that binds
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Published: May 19, 2008
American Idol is the worst thing to happen to American television. It dumbs down our culture, celebrates mediocrity and builds a false sense of suspense into what amounts to no more than a national popularity contest.
And I can't get enough of it.
Now the finals of this year's competition, the seventh to date, are upon us, and America can go gaga again over whether it will be David or David who wins the title, and a recording contract, concert tour, etc.
Being named the American Idol means as much in pop-culture terms as it does in CD sales or downloads — it's as if we were crowning our own Princess Diana every year, a new sacrificial lamb for the media slaughter.
But it does prove irresistible, once you get hooked (or does that sound like an anti-drug ad?). Like many males, I was introduced to American Idol by my wife, as a compromise TV show that we could watch together. She does not share my enthusiasm for The Daily Show, and about the only other programming we can agree on is on HBO, and its good series are all off the air.
My wife is a musician, loves to hear people sing, and has definite opinions on who's cute and who's not. I am completely tone-deaf, wouldn't go to a karaoke bar if you paid me, and believe that no one can look cute in some of the outfits they pick for the American Idol performers.
None of that stops me from watching. I look forward to my Tuesday night American Idol fix like a lonely junkie. Who will mess up this week? How much can Simon Cowell's lip actually curl? Is Paula Abdul still on our planet? Would someone please give Ryan Seacrest a tranquilizer?
I am not alone in posing these questions. One of the things that have startled me since I became an Idol addict is how many people share my problem. We don't have a water cooler in our office, but if we did, it would be busy.
There isn't much we have in common in our fragmented, media-centric culture, but American Idol is like the Super Bowl (and what the Academy Awards used to be) in functioning as a national unity symbol, an artifact that is familiar and recognizable to virtually all Americans.
And it's fun to watch, at least more fun than most of the Super Bowls (except for the commercials).
My wife and I have a great time dishing on this contestant's squeaky clean and overly scrubbed personality, that one's bedroom eyes that can make my wife swoon (and we're watching this in our bedroom, remember). We scorn the aspirants' song choices, their staging and most all of their outfits, but we're two of those 30 million viewers and 45 million voters each and every week.
Like all of network television, American Idol's ratings are down this year, and the biggest audience deserting the program is the youngest one. Many of these teenagers and young adults are probably watching the Idol performances on YouTube or MySpace, but my theory is that the "mature" audience, as we politely designate ourselves, is growing steadily.
Why? Because it's one of the few shared experiences that connects us with our childhood, and the distant memory of the Major Bowes' Amateur Hour, or the local talent shows that were on every Sunday morning when we were growing up.
And American Idol is also one of the few politically neutral shows available for couples to watch: men and women compete equally, and while the reasons for some contestants to survive week after week are inexplicable (remember Sanjaya?), you don't really get the sense that the voting is being done on racial, gender or political lines.
So who do I think will win in the finals this Wednesday night? My opinion barely counts (because there are some 44,999,999 other opinions, too), but in the battle of the Davids, my wife is voting for the bedroom eyes.
They may be his eyes, but it's still my bedroom.
■ Dale Pollock, a former dean at the School of Filmmaking at the N.C. School of the Arts, now teaches film there.
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