Please RSVP for Sour Lemonade in the Doghouse with the Queen on Wednesday Nights
Tuesday night, in the off season, means it’s time for the next installment of America’s Got Talent and we’re up to the semi-finals now. It’s fun to watch all the auditions, which is what draws me in the first place, and since I’m standing by waiting for my favorites to come back on, AGT’s got my attention. With ten acts performing last night and only four moving to the next round, my opinions are becoming more and more critical, but still don’t mean much since it’s not my million bucks on the line. Nonetheless, the show managed to keep my attention for the full hour and yes, I’ll be there to see if my opinions matched the rest of America.
On the bottom, and as much as I hate to admit it, Piers is right, at least some of the time and frankly, I have to agree with his opinion of the forgettable magic act by Boulderite – Drew Thomas. Yes, it was cute that he used his daughter and the backstory of a lemonade stand, but how many times can the assistants appear and disappear and reappear and re-disappear? It’s time to close down that lemonade stand and disappear the whole act from the show. For Tony and Rory, I think it’s time for the doggie act to go home, too, because while the dog does fine, I think his master has put the act in the doghouse. The only thing that changes is from where the dog jumps to catch the frisbee. As for Arcadian Broad, I’m still trying to figure out if they’re High School Musical rejects or botched ballerinas. He might have won my high school talent show, if we’d had one.
On the fence for me would have to be Acrodunk, the flipping, ball dunking guys that opened the show, started off with some of the same old stuff and I fully expected to hear a buzzer mid-way through when it got boring. Then suddenly they lit up the stage, literally, by dunking balls into rings of fire and then tossing one guy himself through a ring of fire! I guess the smoke didn’t get in his eyes because he still made the dunk. Similarly, the husband-wife duo of Paradizo Dance is losing its luster. The costumes have more sparkle than the act, but they might be able to change it up to keep an entire show running for 90 minutes. The Texas Tenor guys are ok, but they haven’t really sealed the deal, yet. They’re good, but I don’t think they’re Las Vegas good. Coming from East Tennessee and Dollywood country, I think they’d do better as a featured concert at the park. Voices of Glory, the trio of siblings, has a great talent in the little girl and while her brothers aren’t bad, she really is the standout performer. If they’ll quit trying to share the spotlight between them equally and spotlight her, I might move them off the fence and into the my “yes” column.
Finally, my top picks are the ones that actually kept me in the room even when I really, really had to pee! Ok, that’s TMI, but really, each act is only a minute and 45 seconds long and then add another 30 seconds for the judge’s comments, so it seemed worth it to just hold it. From the first audition, I loved the Fab Five clogging/tapping troupe. Those five ladies can do some truly amazing things with a little metal nailed to their shoes! They’re synchronized, creative, energetic and all out entertaining! As a middle-income average spectator, I’d jump at the opportunity to buy their tickets! The chicken farmer, Kevin Skinnard is an amazing singer. He’s got the biggest heart and he’s got genuine talent. Country music needs him on stage because he really takes the music back to its country roots and he’s not in this just for the money, he just wants to share his passion. Finally, I truly laugh out loud every time Grandma Lee hits the stage because I just never know what she’ll say next, but it’s all her own stuff! When the 75-year-old prefaced her last bit with “God Bless America and God Save the Queen” I certainly wasn’t expecting her to strip down to British flag boxers saying she’d finally “gotten into Piers’ shorts”. She’s a riot and it’d be a pity to keep all that locked away for Thanksgiving dinners and Christmas mornings! Perhaps she really should have said “God Save America” because there’s no doubt that America’s Got Talent!