A dowdy, matronly, apparently virginal cat lady from the backwaters of Scotland has done it! Susan Boyle has become the talk of the town (yet not Indian towns) and topic of water cooler gossip around the world.As a participant of Britain’s Got Talent, a talent hunt show in UK, she generated a collective gasp of appreciation from a skeptical audience and panel of judges waiting to tear her to pieces. And why would THAT generate this mass hysteria, you may ask with genuine wonder. And I might agree with you whole heartedly but for the fact that critics and admirers across the seven seas have been waxing eloquent over her for the past 2 weeks.
Well check out her photograph and you’ll accept that she looks more like a frumpy, middle-aged couch potato than an aspiring professional singer. And that’s where the audience, used to the vocal driveling of pretty plastic pop aspirants, got the surprise of their lives when she serenaded them with her spectacular rendition of ‘I Dream A Dream’ from Les Miserables. To the audience and judges credit, there was a long round of heart felt applause and well deserved coining of the “NEXT SINGING SENSATION”, a title so far reserved for wannabe Miley Cyruses (Britney Spears having gone out of Teen favor).
The producers must be patting their ego-laden backs for having casually presented the world with such a ‘discovery’, though obviously they knew what a rough (only in appearance) diamond they had on their hands since all participants have to go through a screening process. Yet they predictably tried to make this a grand ‘onscreen’ discovery (what else in this age of reality TV) by presenting her as part of the notional group of misfits and weirdoes that are specially selected for entertainment in between the serious business of Talent Hunt.
The in studio audience and the acerbic Simon C. looked down their noses at this frumpy woman and nearly booed her before being flabbergasted by her voice. This raises two questions:
As much as Susan Boyle is being promoted as a singing sensation, her looks are getting plenty attention too (quite a few observers already suggesting an extreme makeover). The fact that she is 47 and noones idea of pretty stumps everyone, enough to show how we now expect all packages to be complete, pretty face=pretty voice or vice versa. Hence the first question, would there be as much celebration for Susan Boyle (in just a preliminary round of talent hunt) if she were another pretty young thing? Does skill matter more when the skilled is marred or ugly because it warms our heart to see beauty (of voice) juxtaposed with ugliness (of face and body)?
Also Susans’ deprived background (she is barely trained, never employed and has for the past few decades solely looked after her ailing mother, hence no boyfriend) is being bandied about as much as praise for her voice. This leads to the second question, does her humble background add/lead to the aura around her obvious skill? Would everyone be as awestruck if she sang like a nightingale AND was a silk stocking trust fund kid? Do we tend to romanticize struggle, refer Kailash Kher and Rabbi Shergill?
Despite the discomfort of these questions, Susan qualifies to be called a Jewel, deserving the 50 million hits to her Youtube video (historical) and is the object of adoration of the many fan sites devoted to her. Whatever the result of the show, she has temporarily won the hearts of the public, Oprah Winfrey AND Good Morning America producers among others.
Defying all logic she has stayed in public memory for more than a week. It is to be seen if she manages to compete with elections and IPL to attract the attention of Indian media soon. Just remembered Abhijeet Sawant….where art thou?
PS: check out http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxPZh4AnWyk
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