OMG, Idol was great last night!

I wrote recently about my love/hate relationship with American Idol. There have been some pretty horrendous audition episodes so far this season, and I didn’t expect much different from last night’s combined “New York”/Puerto Rico auditions. In case you didn’t know, the “New York” is because the auditions were actually held in East Rutherford, New Jersey, which is as much New York as Portugal is Spain. But, I digress.

I was seriously, utterly, completely entertained by last night’s installment of American Idol! In fact, I don’t think I was annoyed in the least little bit by this episode. It was free of bad-audition sing-alongs, which irk me to no end, and in fact, even a lot of the bad auditions they showed weren’t that bad. They were just normal people who didn’t make the cut, for the most part. Simon even talked to the boss of a girl who didn’t make it through, to help her get her job back because she had quit to be part of the show.

There were, however, a couple of random, larger than life auditioners, and they were really the ones who made Idol so watchable last night. If you watched, you know exactly which ones I’m talking about.

Over in Puerto Rico there was Joel Contreras. I admit, I wouldn’t want to be the guy outside selling ice cream Joel serenaded by screaming “YOU! ARE SELLING ICE CREAM!” about three inches from his face. It’s true Joel has definitely seen a few too many episodes of Jackass, but I laughed at him all the same.

Between his giant iPod cutout (guyPod) and the adorable lion hand puppet he held in front of his face while singing “Circle of Life,” I don’t know what amused me more.  When the judges tell him no, he’s obviously gotten what he came for because he runs out shouting, “I got a no!” To be honest, I love auditions like this because it’s a big middle finger to the whole process that I hate so much.

Right after Joel, we got the guy in the picture above, Nick Mitchell, or as he likes to be called, “Norman Gentle.” I love him! Look at his shiny pink and silver shirt, headband and early- ’90s accountant glasses. Not pictured are his matching wristbands, khaki shorts, and black mid-calf socks. If his outfit weren’t enough to convince you that Mr. Gentle is awesome, his personality makes me think that somehow Richard Simmons and Dwight Schrute had a lovechild, and this is him.

This is the kind of guy who never, ever gets through to Hollywood, but thanks to the hilarious back-and-forth he had with Simon (“You mean the way you like it when Seacrest does it?”), and the fact that as bizarre as he his, he has a decent voice, he’s through! I hope we get to see a lot more of Norman Gentle in Hollywood next week because like Kara said, he doesn’t have a shot in hell at getting to the top 36.

The thing with this season of American Idol is, at least for me, even the so-called good auditions haven’t been that good. There’s only been a handful of hopefuls that I’ve really enjoyed watching and wanted to do well. For the most part, they’re the quirky ones who barely made it through to Hollywood and received a ton of criticism on their looks/personality/song choice/you name it.

Has the feeling been the same with all you other Idol watchers? Did you laugh throughout last night’s episode as much as I did?

Clacked by Cate Cropp
on Jan 30, 2009 @ 15:04 EST5EDT