by Elton, Ben
‘Will do.’
Next Calvin turned to the costume department.
‘What have you dressed her in?’
‘A beautiful dark trouser suit with a silver pinstripe,’ Costume replied. ‘Slims her down a bit and hides her legs. Her tits are really all we’ve got to work with so we’ll open up her shirt a few buttons and lead with the cleavage. Accessories-wise I thought maybe a homburg hat and—’
‘Wrong,’ Calvin interrupted, ‘wrong, wrong, wrong. Give her a boiler suit and a T-shirt with ALL MEN ARE RAPISTS written on it.’
‘Do you think she’ll wear it?’
‘She will wear what we fucking well tell her to. They are all under contract.’
Chelsie and Trent were tasked to brief Tabitha on what was being planned for her and to ensure that she did her bit towards her own destruction. Theoretically it should have been Beryl doing this job because in the fiction of the programme Tabitha was one of the acts Beryl was supposed to be ‘nurturing’. The reality was that all three judges had long since given up even pretending that they had anything to do with the contestants prior to their actual performances. The researchers and producers did all the interacting, occasionally sending flowers and messages on the judges’ behalf and always being sure to remind the contestants to thank the judges for these small gestures live on air.
It was the ‘nurturing’ fiction that amused Beryl most. She loved it. It made her feel invulnerable, like she could get away with anything.
‘People actually believe this shit!’ she would say to her friends in the States, shrieking with laughter at the very idea. ‘They believe I go down to the fucking rehearsal rooms each day and hold my contestants’ fucking hands! It’s incredible. I am proud to say that there has never been a single fucking shot of me working with any of these assholes, not on their routines, not on their songs and not on their emotional well-being, and yet still people believe that I’m some kind of mother hen! It’s wonderful. Incredible. One day I swear I shall turn to that camera and tell the viewers what a bunch of fucking morons the contestants really are. But I love them, of course. They’re my people.’
Love them or hate them, Beryl most certainly was not prepared to do any work with them and so it was Chelsie and Trent who, together with some junior researchers, travelled up to the block of service flats in Kilburn where the contestants were being housed and briefed Tabitha on what was expected of her.
It took a bit of selling.
‘All Men Are Rapists,’ Tabitha said dubiously. ‘You think people will like that?’
‘Well, not all the people,’ Chelsie conceded, ‘but at this stage of the competition with all twelve acts still in it you need to develop a niche vote.’
‘But “Sexual Healing”? Isn’t that a bit graphic?’
‘Absolutely. There’s nothing better than a bit of graphic sapphic. Trust me. You have to paint with broad strokes on this show. You only get a couple of minutes to make an impact. Now about the intro clip, what do you want to say?’
Chelsie was referring to the video package that preceded each finalist’s performance, in which they were filmed against a black backdrop looking moody with wind in their hair, while they recounted their fears and hopes in voiceover.
‘Well,’ Tabitha replied, ‘I thought I’d talk about how I’m dead nervous and that I’ve worked really hard because I really, really want to be a singer.’
Chelsie frowned.
‘Hmm, I think it would have much more impact if you were to talk about how you wished that you and your girlfriend had a daughter who you could dedicate the song to and how you believe that IVF for single-parent lesbians should be available free by right on the NHS and you should be allowed to choose the sex so you don’t get a boy because . . .’
‘All men are rapists?’ Tabitha enquired.
‘Exactly. People will love you for having strong principles.’
Tabitha did what she was told to do and was rewarded with a cacophony of booing from the studio audience. Barry and Gary had made it clear in their warm-up that the audience were to feel free to express themselves as loudly as they wished and that booing was acceptable.
Before the telephone votes had been counted it was obvious that Tabitha would be one of the two who were up for rejection.
Encouraged by Keely, the judges indulged in a few moments of clunking, mahogany-hewn banter.
‘How could you have given her that song?’ Rodney spluttered.
‘It’s a great song,’ Beryl replied. ‘It’s a Marvin Gaye song.’
‘Yes, and it should have been left to Marvin Gaye. The song was too big for her.’
‘Yes, Tabitha,’ Beryl conceded in her cooing, croaky, trying-to-be-nice voice, ‘I’m afraid that the song was just too big for you.’
Tabitha was up against Latiffa for rejection but there was never any doubt about who would be going home.
‘Tabs babes,’ Keely said, ‘is there anything you would like to say to the judges?’
‘Well, I wasn’t really happy with the choice of song—’
‘The song was great, lady,’ Calvin interrupted. ‘It was just too big for you.’
Tabitha might have liked to add that she wasn’t happy with her choice of costume either but sadly her time was up.
Week Two
Having dispensed with Tabitha in an orgy of press hatred in week one, the following week Calvin targeted Latiffa, the wannabe Tina Turner of the group. Previously Calvin had been careful to edit Latiffa’s character in a favourable light, making her self-confidence seem positive and strong and her belief in her own sexiness larger than life and sassy. Now he turned all his guns against her, using song choice, costume and pre-performance profile to transform her instantly into a noisy, irritating, loud-mouthed, self-deluded show-off. He gave her ‘Simply The Best’ to sing and pitched it in Tina Turner’s original key, which was way too high for Latiffa. They dressed her in the sort of micro skirt that Tina had worn in the eighties and for which you required legs that had seen a lot fewer kebabs than Latiffa had, and they recorded a profile in which she was coaxed into sounding like an arrogant, self-serving bore.
‘Last week I didn’t feel I showed half of what I can be . . . Now the gloves are off and the viewers are going to get to see the real me . . . Calvin said he thought I hit a couple of bad notes – out of order, that really hurt . . . It’s been a tough week for me but I am a strong woman and I will be strong . . . So bring it on, Calvin, because this girl is Simply the Best.’
Not surprisingly Latiffa’s arrogance did not play well against her strained, shrill performance. Calvin was brutal.
‘I just don’t think you have a place in this competition,’ he said, neglecting to explain why in that case she had been chosen to be a finalist.
Beryl damned with faint praise.
‘I love you, Latiffa, you know that, but I just think the song was too big for you.’
Calvin hammered the last nail into Latiffa’s coffin by instructing Rodney to give her his full support.
‘Latiffa,’ Rodney said dutifully, ‘you had strength, you had power, you’re sexy, you’re sassy, you sang it better than Tina Turner and I believe that you could be an even bigger star.’
Latiffa inevitably ended up in the bottom two of the public vote and Calvin and Beryl voted her off, with Rodney still protesting that she was a huge talent who should and would get a recording deal immediately.
The other feature of the second week was the surprising success of Bloke, the rough-diamond geezer band who claimed to have ‘paid their dues’. Calvin ensured that both Beryl and Rodney greeted Bloke’s performance of U2’s ‘I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For’ as if Bono and The Edge themselves had been performing it.
‘I love you boys,’ said Rodney. ‘That was fabulous, totally rock ’n’ roll. You deserve to have huge careers in the recording industry. No more clubs for you. No more paying your dues. You are going to be as big as U2.’
‘I looo
oooove you guys,’ Beryl added in her sexiest croak. ‘You are so hot! You know what? You owned that stage. I’m a rock chick from way back and I loved it.’
Even Calvin was supportive.
‘You know what?’ he said, doing his surprised but honest act. ‘You guys were really good. I honestly didn’t think you had it in you. But now I think you could go all the way and win this thing.’
Calvin treated Bloke this way because he knew from analysis of the phone votes that they were not at all popular with the TV audience, having polled third from last in the first week.
‘It’s no good acts going out without a fight, without a bit of drama,’ he would berate the team. ‘They can’t just be shit then slope off. Greek tragedy rules! If the gods are going to destroy someone they must first exalt them. And we are the fucking gods.’
As he had planned, Calvin had kept the Prince as low on the radar as possible. His Royal Highness had been allowed to dress himself, which meant his appearing in tweed jackets and good stout brogues, which had been incongruous but endearing. He had been given innocuous but sympathetic material to sing – ‘Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head’ in week one and ‘Mr Cellophane’ from Chicago in week two – and he had recorded only the briefest personal video package from the fireside of his town house.
‘I only hope I don’t make an absolute muggins of myself,’ he said in week one. ‘My boys have teased me endlessly.’
‘I just feel enormously privileged to be a part of it all,’ he added in week two. ‘I’m quite sure I’m the least deserving singer here.’
The result was that the public had quickly come to accept the Prince’s presence on the show and while many commentators continued to bemoan the massive damage that he was doing to his position, others, particularly the popular press, were starting to enjoy it, even noting that the Prince was the first Chart Throb candidate ever to consider the possibility that they might not be the best.
Is self-effacement the new bling? they mused.
Week Three
In week three Chelsie and Trent travelled up to Kilburn and instructed Bloke to sing an Elvis medley: ‘Heartbreak Hotel’, ‘All Shook Up’, ‘American Trilogy’, ‘In The Ghetto’ and ‘Rock-A-Hula Baby’.
‘It’s a medley,’ Chelsie explained. ‘Five songs.’
‘“American Trilogy” is already a medley,’ one Bloke pointed out dubiously, ‘so that’s seven songs.’
‘If you insist,’ Chelsie said. ‘I’m not into old man music myself.’
‘Seven songs in three minutes?’ another Bloke remarked. ‘It’s going to be hard to get into the soul of it.’
‘This is all about range, guys,’ Trent insisted, ‘demonstrating range.’
In fact it was all about hubris, one of Calvin’s favourite tools of the trade.
‘If you want to alienate an act from the audience, give them the King,’ Calvin explained as he laid out his plans at the week three research meeting. ‘Covering the King represents hubris set to music. It’s the biggest, most famous, most immediately recognizable voice in rock ’n’ roll and anyone singing his songs invites instant and damning comparison. It is virtually impossible for an act to survive covering Elvis at this stage of the competition and I can tell you now, a bunch of hod carriers from Stockport certainly aren’t going to.’
Bloke were therefore tasked by their ‘nurturer’ (Rodney, represented by Chelsie and Trent) to cover seven disparate Elvis tracks in their allotted three minutes. And as if the grim comparison with the most successful and influential solo entertainer of all time was not clear enough, the unfortunate club singers were given Vegas Elvis jumpsuits to wear.
‘Wouldn’t jeans and black shirts be better?’ the lead Bloke enquired. ‘We look good in jeans and black shirts.’
Chelsie assured them that the producers knew best and jumpsuits it was.
On the night the band were greeted by a cacophony of cheers as they entered the stage. Gary and Barry put in an extra-special effort during the ad break that preceded Bloke’s performance and by the time their moment came the crazily whipped-up crowd could probably have been persuaded to elect Bloke dictators and follow them in an invasion of Poland.
‘I’d like to introduce some really good blokes,’ Rodney said, in his role as ‘nurturer’. ‘They’ve done their time, they’ve paid their dues, they’ve taken the knocks. Now their moment has come. I am very proud to introduce the future chart sensations, Bloke!’
Bloke did not enter immediately. First came their pre-performance video package in which they grimaced solemnly and spoke with anguish about their long, long struggle in rock ’n’ roll.
‘We’ve paid our dues,’ said one.
‘We’ve done our time,’ said another.
Together they stood, with a grim wall at their backs, staring into the wind machine like warriors about to take up their swords in the defence of freedom and the weak.
‘This is our moment,’ one of them said.
‘Our one moment in time,’ said the bloke next to him.
‘This is our moment,’ the first repeated.
‘Our one moment in time,’ the other bloke said again.
Chelsie had only been able to persuade two of the four men to say these things but Calvin had got round that by playing both quotes twice.
‘We deserve this. It’s ours and we’re gonna grab it with all eight hands,’ Bloke said together. ‘Tonight belongs to Bloke.’
Not surprisingly, this carefully edited, excruciating display of arrogance further alienated an already deeply unenthusiastic public. It looked particularly grim as it followed the Prince of Wales’s customarily apologetic statements.
‘I expect I shall be absolutely awful again and will be smartly chucked out on my ear, which is probably no more than I deserve and a great relief for everybody.’
Bloke walked on in their rhinestone jumpsuits to the previously orchestrated cheers and attacked their medley with gusto, but without quite the charisma that Elvis Presley had brought to the songs.
When, as Calvin had planned, they entered the lowest two (alongside Suki) he was merciless.
‘Well, lads. It was truly, horribly, disgustingly, cringe-makingly awful,’ he said.
‘Calvin!’ Rodney protested.
‘No, Rodney, it was!’ Calvin replied. ‘And the truth is, Rodney, that you are massively to blame. The boys aren’t great but they aren’t as bad as that . . .’
‘I admit that the song was too big for them . . .’ Rodney spluttered.
‘The song!’ Calvin replied, aghast. ‘There were seven songs there, mate, and they were all too big for them.’
Beryl agreed.
‘Boys,’ she croaked in the voice she fondly believed the nation adored her for, ‘you know I love you big time and I think you’re so sexy it’s not funny, but the song was too big for you, the songs were too big for you. You can’t cover the King.’
Finally Keely invited Rodney, as ‘nurturing’ judge, to comment.
‘Boys, I thought you were quite brilliant. You’re true stars. Superstars even, and whatever happens here tonight you have huge recording careers ahead of you. You four could be the new U2.’
What happened was that Bloke were voted off and returned instantly to obscurity.
Emma and Shaiana
With Calvin so heavily engaged in the weekly turnaround of live shows, Emma found herself with time on her hands. Of course she had her work and her friends but what she really wanted was to be with Calvin, and in his absence she found herself dwelling on the show. In particular her thoughts turned increasingly to Shaiana. Calvin had virtually forgotten the girl by this time; she was just one of hundreds of disappointed people who had figured briefly in the Chart Throb process before disappearing for ever. But Emma could not forget her. In fact she was thinking about her more and more.
Calvin had been forced to heavily edit the footage of Shaiana being ejected from Pop School. The wounded girl’s reaction had been too angry and passi
onate even by Chart Throb standards and she had of course used the word ‘cunt’, which remained the final linguistic taboo on television. Emma, however, had asked to see all the footage and had found it most disturbing. After watching it a number of times she had not surprisingly found that she couldn’t get the vicious, spiteful outburst out of her head.
‘I have nowhere to go. I had only planned my life up to this point.’
Emma had clearly been wrong in her initial assessment of Shaiana. She had marked her down only as a victim but it was clear now that she was capable of being an aggressor too. Her victimhood had empowered her.
‘Don’t you understand? God made me for this purpose,’ Shaiana said on the tape that Emma could not resist watching. ‘Who are you to contradict the word of God?’
Emma knew enough about psychotics to be aware that knowing God’s will was a popular motivation among murderous lunatics and that anyone claiming to get their orders directly from the Almighty was deeply suspect.
‘You haven’t heard the last of me, Calvin fucking Simms.’
Week Four
In week four Calvin turned his attention to Stanley, the plucky single dad.
Up until that point the judges had spoken of Stanley only in the most ecstatic tones, bigging him up as a new Sinatra or Dean Martin. In week one Stanley had sung ‘Ain’t That A Kick In The Head’, in week two ‘Mack The Knife’ and in week three ‘It Was A Very Good Year’. It was generally Chart Throb policy to give anyone over thirty-five songs dating from the 1950s and early sixties, in much the same way as they gave the feisty old grannies songs from the Edwardian era.
Stanley’s week three performance had been a huge success, every bit as popular as Bloke’s Elvis Presley medley had been a public disaster. Costume had dressed Stanley in a tux and a casually draped bow tie. The music department had given him a gaggle of gorgeous violinists all turned out in their obligatory little black dresses. The director had lit the stage with a romantic moodiness (in stark contrast to Bloke’s brash Vegas-style staging) and the vision mixer had cut as often as possible to shots of Beryl looking utterly entranced, hovering ecstatically halfway between tears and lust. It all worked beautifully and as this thirty-eight-year-old sang ‘It Was A Very Good Year’, that famous song of mature reflection, it was almost possible to believe that he had indeed lived a long and varied life filled with excitement and romance, played out across the dreamscape of a mid-twentieth-century America.