The Stage

Return to main Advice page

Dear John

Should I train or take the TV gig?

Question:
I've been singing for several years and my career is growing slowly but surely, although I don't have an agent or manager as yet. I've been approached to audition for a TV talent show and told I have a good chance of getting through. If I do, there will be some coaching and grooming I'm told. My family says I should go for it, while some of my singer friends say I'd be selling out. I'm not that keen on having my private life exposed on TV but if I'm honest I don't want to miss a big break either. What do you think?

Answer:
Every exam season all those screaming headlines about results and the allocation of university places make it easy to lose track of one simple underlying truth - passing an exam proves nothing except that you are good at passing exams. Graduating from college (even drama college) shows only that you are good at making it through a particular learning system.

In both cases, you still have to prove yourself in the real world afterwards with no guarantees. The truth about television talent shows is somewhat similar.

It is certainly true that any kind of education, training or grooming is an advantage but the educational value of the new brand of TV talent show where, as well as seeing the performances, we follow the learning journey of the competitors along the way, isn't quite as clear cut.

The first thing to bear in mind is that however they are presented, the main purpose of television talent shows is not to discover, train and nurture new talent, it is simply to satisfy advertisers by pulling in viewers.

Sadly, the perceived wisdom in TV circles seems to be that tears and tantrums are more likely to do that than actual performances. Hence the selection process and the screen time once the televised heats get going usually tend to favour a mix of contestants slanted towards either the hopeless and easily humiliated or the human interest performers, who may not have the most polished skills but have some story to tell which will be of tabloid interest.

Yes, promising performers get through on their own merits too but a successful career is a marathon, not a sprint, and there are occasions when a promising but inexperienced performer may do themselves more harm then good by being exposed too early.

Once on the show itself, the focus will tend to be as much, if not more, on the egos and personalities of the judges or presenters than on the performances and, as with all reality TV, there is likely to be very little reality in the product that reaches the screen.

From judge's supposedly witty reactions, which have actually been scripted long before you perform, to entire sequences which are broadcast in a different order to the way they were actually shot, there are a whole range of techniques the programme-makers can use to make the show more interesting. But more interesting may not necessarily translate into showing your act off to best advantage.

Certainly you may get the chance to be trained and advised by bona fide experts - the Grants on Fame Academy or the Musicality judges spring to mind - but useful though this is, even if you make it through all the hoops, into the final and actually win the contest, these days that is not necessarily a guarantee of even the standard 15 minutes of fame.

Looking over the not very glorious history of recent TV talent searches, some of the runners-up such as the Liberty Xs and Lemars seem to have had longer careers than many of the outright winners.

So should you do it? Well despite all I've said above, if you go into it with both eyes open I don't see why you shouldn't give it a go. Just make sure you treat it as one of the things you are doing to advance your career and not the big break on which your entire career success hinges. Give your best at the auditions and heats as you should be doing at any show you are involved in, be it to movers and shakers in the industry or three senior citizens in the local pub.

Listen to any advice you are given, try it if you think it will work and discard it if it does not. If you get knocked out early go back to your on-going career plan and view whatever you have learned as experience to draw on when the next opportunity arises, rather than as a setback to slow you down.

And if you get to the finals and especially if you win, do slow down.

You should have already planned in advance how you can use whatever fame and fortune you achieve to get you where you want to be, not where the other people who will suddenly turn up in your life tell you you ought to be.

Advice from family and genuine friends can certainly help keep you grounded but what you are looking for now is people with proven industry ability and the commitment to stick with you beyond the breaks. In fact that is what you should be looking for whether you decide to enter the talent contest or not.

To identify those people you'll need to be a lot more discerning than your average TV show judge.