Falling 'Star' Alyson Gilbert
By Paulette Tobin
Tonight I watched Crookston native Alyson Gilbert get eliminated from "Nashville Star," the NBC show that's pitting country singers against one another to win a national recording contract and a chance to sing at the summer Olympics.
Gilbert was in the bottom two Monday night with the young singing duo Laura and Sophie, so viewers knew one of them would be going home. Alyson sang first in the elimination round, "She's in Love With the Boy," and she had her moments, but it was not a stellar performance.
Then Laura and Sophie sang (I forget what) and I thought: "Well, Alyson's safe because that sounded just like two girls who'd get an honorable mention ribbon at the county fair."
Judges Jewel, John Rich and Jeffrey Steele blasted both performances. I think they were right in saying Alyson was having some real problems keeping her head in the game. But to send her home and keep Laura and Sophie??? What were they smoking?
I think the judges were way too generous Monday night when they compared Laura and Sophie's singing with a high school talent contest. Those girls do not have the chops for a national contest. It could be a different story in a few years from now -- the girls are very young -- but right now? No.
With Gilbert, on the other hand, it wasn't a lack of talent that caused her star to fall. For whatever reason, she just could not make things happen when it counted. Among the judges' comments Monday night to Gilbert: "We've heard you sing so much better than this."
Gilbert is talented and beautiful and classy, the total performer package. Who knows what her second act will be?
In the meantime, another local girl -- Ashlee Hewitt of Lancaster, Minn. -- continues to rise on "Nashville Star." She was chosen to sing first Monday night, which means she's doing really well. She seems to be making all the right moves, so stay tuned. She could very well be the next "Nashville Star."
(Tobin is arts and entertainment reporter at the Grand Forks Herald, Grand Forks, N.D.)
Posted by: tobin on 6/30/2008 at 10:22 PM | Comments (2) | Permalink
P.S. -- You were OK.
By Paulette Tobin
Here's another in my "series" of movie reviews for people like me, who generally see movies six to 12 months after they've been released.
"P.S. I Love You" (2007) was a frustrating movie.The first five minutes were so contrived and lame, I was tempted to turn it off. Lucky for the producers, I will take a lot of abuse to watch Gerard Butler.
As love stories go, this was a heart breaker. Even so, the premise (which I won't discuss just in case there are readers who haven't seen it) could have shown us much more of what drew Holly (Hillary Swank) and Gerry (Butler) together in the first place.
Good stuff: Holly's friends (Lisa Kudrow and Gina Gershon) were superb. Kathy Bates (as Holly's mother) gave the movie its center of gravity.
Bad stuff: The whole Harry Connick Jr. story line was a waste. I never bought his friendship with Holly, much less a romance. Also, Holly's misadventures in the karaoke bar. It wasn't funny. It wasn't particularly moving. What was the point?
Other good stuff: Holly's great shoe designs.
I'd put "P.S. I Love You" on my "movies that seemed like a good idea but never fulfilled their premise" list.
(Tobin is arts & entertainment reporter at the Grand Forks Herald, Grand Forks ND.)
Posted by: tobin on 6/30/2008 at 5:10 PM | Comments (0) | Permalink
Bye, George
By Paulette Tobin
Nice tribute in this morning's Herald to George Carlin written by former Herald Staff Writer Carissa Green. (Letter to the editor, "A word Carlin could say on television: Wise," Page A4, June 27) Green wrote about Carlin based on her experience interviewing him in 1995.
Carissa wrote: "He wanted to get to the core of what he was thinking about: Comedy as an art form, a craft requiring attention and passion, and how he viewed his work as seriously as a musician or painter. He talked of the importance of developing a broad perspective, looking at the world from outside the mainstream."
To me the best comedy is smart comedy. I'm not particularly offended by comedians who use The Seven Words You Can't Say on Television, or variations thereof. It's the context for me that's important. I like my comedy with less ham, more wry, and always smart and cool. And there was no one smarter, or cooler, than George Carlin.
Carlin's passing earlier this week reminded me of the early 1970s, when my brother, Dave, and I, both teenagers growing up on the farm, would stay up to watch George Carlin on Johnny Carson. One of his funniest bits was a TV weatherman who was maybe a bit too relaxed, in part because he definitely was inhaling what he was smoking. "I'm the hippie-dippy weatherman with your hippie, dippy weather, man," he'd intone. "Tonight's forecast: Dark."
For a whacked out character, the hippie dippy weatherman understood the world around him oh so well. And so did Carlin. By paying attention, by being passionate, by looking at the world from outside the mainstream, he broke ground for many of today's best comics and entertainers, including (in my opinion) guys like Bill Maher and Jon Stewart.
Rest in Peace, George, you smart and funny man.
(Tobin is arts & entertainment reporter at the Grand Forks Herald, Grand Forks N.D.)
Posted by: tobin on 6/27/2008 at 11:48 AM | Comments (0) | Permalink
Belly shirt-gate
By Paulette Tobin
Ashlee Hewitt of Lancaster, Minn., is an angelic looking blonde. She is one of more than a dozen kids raised on a ranch, home-schooled by their parents, and has been singing country since she was a little girl. Now, just 20 years old, she's one of nine finalists competing on NBC's "Nashville Star" -- the "American Idol" of country music -- for a major recording contract.
I've been following the progress of Ashlee (and of Alyson Gilbert, a native of Crookston, and another "Nashville Star" finalist) through stories in the Herald. Each time I've talked to Ashlee, she's been cheerful and sweet and so excited about her opportunity for big-time exposure for her budding country career.
However, after Monday's night's show, which aired from 8 to 10 on Channel 11, I'm a little confused.
I interviewed Ashlee (by telephone) on June 20. And one of the things she told me was how she was resisting the efforts of the "Nasvhille Star" wardrobe people to get her to wear a belly shirt that exposed her stomach.
"No way," Hewitt told me. It would set a bad example for her younger sister and for other young women and girls for whom she would like to be a role model, she told me.
"Besides, it's a country show," she told me (and we quoted her in a story in the June 21 Herald. "Maybe Britney Spears could get away with it, but not me."
Monday night, a narrow strip of Ashlee's stomach appeared to be exposed.
And she sang "Crazy," a Britney Spears song. (It was "Pop Goes Country" night on "Star.")
Was that Ashlee's belly on national television?
(Tobin is arts & entertainment reporter for the Grand Forks Herald, Grand Forks N.D.)
Is that Ashlee's bare midriff we see? Ashlee Hewitt with "Nashville Star" host Billy Ray Cyrus on the show broadcast June 30.
Posted by: tobin on 6/26/2008 at 11:38 AM | Comments (1) | Permalink
Grandma would have understood Carrie and Mr. Big
By Paulette Tobin
(*SPOILER ALERT* If you haven't seen the movie "Sex and the City, you may want to stop reading right now.)
This weekend my daughter and I saw "Sex and the City," the two-hours-plus-long movie (based on the groundbreaking HBO series) about Carrie, Miranda, Charlotte and Samantha, four Manhattan women challenged by their lives, relationships and wardrobes.
We gave it two thumbs way up. We especially loved:
***Carrie's 1980s style show, featuring stuff from way back in her closet.
***The one-liners. One of the best: When Samantha shows up with a midriff bulge that reflects a personal conflict she's trying to resolve, Carrie asks her: "What does your gut tell you?"
***Samantha's putdown of an obnoxious oaf at a wedding dinner who's trying to pass off his nastry remarks as humor while she trying to make a toast. "Shut up, dick----, I'm talking," she finally yells at him. Oh, let me count the times I've wished I had the guts to do this.
***The tenderness of these womens' friendships. During a heartbreaking personal crisis, Carrie awakens in a darkened room, turns to Samantha and says: "Did I dream it?" Miranda, Charlotte and Samantha have dropped everything to be there for her.
We were perplexed, however, at Carrie's "happy ending" with Mr. Big. Let's face it, he may be able to give her the apartment and closet of her dreams, but he is not a nice man. When the pressure's on, he folds. To quote one of my daughter's friends: "What does Big have to do for Carrie to say, 'That's enough.' Run Miranda over with his limousine?"
The old grossmutters of my Germans from Russia heritage never heard of Manolo Blahnik, but they were familiar with men like Big. They had many folk sayings, homespun but insightful. One of them went like this:
"Wo die liebe na fallt da bleibt sie liebe, und wanns gerade immisthaufe isch."
Translation: "Where love falls, there love stays, and even if it's landed right in a pile of manure."
I can't think of a bigger pile than Mr. Big.
(Tobin is arts & entertainment reporter at the Grand Forks Herald, Grand Forks, N.D.)
Posted by: tobin on 6/9/2008 at 2:50 PM | Comments (1) | Permalink