Early attention isn't everything on 'Idol'
Posted: Wednesday, March 28, 2007 7:36 PM by Gael Fashingbauer Cooper
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TV
If you walked up to a random person with photos of all the "American Idol" contestants and asked them to put names to faces, I'm betting most couldn't get 100 percent. People who'd seen the show could probably identify Sanjaya -- even pre-Mohawk, and maybe a couple other singers. But if they'd seen the show even once, they could probably recognize Chris Sligh.
Sligh had a distinct look from the start. He didn't look like an "Idol," but neither did Taylor Hicks. Sligh was chubby, with a giant Afro, and glasses. A Hollywood stylist would probably have put him on a diet, cut his hair, and given him Lasik surgery before they'd let him perform on a concert stage.
But Sligh was proud of his look, and played it up. His fans were dubbed the "Fro Patro," mimicking Hicks' "Soul Patrol." He joked that he was "bringing chubby back," a la Justin Timberlake bringing sexy back. And it definitely was appealing to see a singer cheerfully going against the traditional grain, saying "Who says I have to look like a Ken doll? This is who I am."
Every season, fans comment on how the singers who get the most airtime early on go further than those who don't. Sligh piled up the airtime early and often. The "Idol" cameras loved Sligh, with his jokes about making David Hasselhoff cry, and of course, his hair (vote here on whether he should choose a different look). He not only got plenty of airtime, he got plenty of press attention, too. Articles were written about how he attended fundamentalist Bob Jones University but no longer sang only Christian music.
But in the end, his unusual looks and his "Fro Patro" weren't enough to keep Chris Sligh in the contest, even against a woman (Haley) so bland that both Simon and Ryan have had trouble remembering her name. Just one more sign of the unpredictablity of "Idol," a contest that may yet see a teenager named Sanjaya go further than anyone would have ever imagined.
Stay tuned. Something tells us this season has more than a few surprises left before the May 23 finale.
