American Idol Extra. 3/16 Re-cap

American Idol Extra is a new behind the scenes show from Fox Reality. Your host is Ty Treadway, who used to be (still is?) a soap actor and co-helms a talk show on SoapNet with Sealy/Serta lipped actress Lisa Rinna. Treadway is backstage with Melissa McGhee immediately after last night’s Idol ouster and she’s pretty matter-of-fact about being voted off the show, saying much of what she said on the Idol broadcast about forgetting her words and such. In the background, the rest of the contestants are being led backstage. None of them even turn to look Melissa’s way or acknowledge her, and why should they? None of them have the stink of failure on them. Yes, they are stink free. At least for one more week.

I think Melissa has a great attitude. I often wonder if sometimes when you know you’re expected to be the weak link, you subconsciously do something to cause it to be true. Melissa probably knew she wasn’t going to last much longer and maybe she didn’t want to put herself through anymore torture. She seems to have made her peace with being voted off. Good luck to you.

The intro to the show is very similar to the actual Idol one, same graphics and theme song. Ty Treadway has way too much fake tan spray on and he looks like an actor from the ‘40s trying to pass as Indian. He’s joined by his two co-hosts- GOD, NO! OH, THE HORROR!!!

Folks, it’s my sad duty to report that Ty Treadway’s co-hosts are none other than Mikalah Gordon and Matt Rogers. I’m sorry. Mikalah is dyed platinum blonde and Matt Rogers is wearing a wedding ring. I always thought he was gay. Whaddya know? Mikalah has agita being back on the stage because next week would be the week she and Matt both got voted off. Ty Treadway starts blinking his eyes involuntarily at the sound of Mikalah’s voice and in addition to the fake tan spray, he’s sporting some scary, bruise colored eyeshadow. Either they are filming him with a black light or he let Melissa McGhee do his make-up because he felt sorry for her.

We get treated to a re-cap of Tuesday night’s performances (shocker!!) played in slow motion with one judge’s comment over each of the finalists. The only ones who get negatives are Kellie and Elliott, even Ace and Kevin get treated to Paula’s loopy praises. Watching Taylor and Paris twitching onstage at that speed makes them look even dorkier.

Matt Rogers was given the task of going backstage to interview the celebrities who were in the audience. He starts out with a biggie, the ubiquitous Eric Millegan from “Bones,” who imparted his vast knowledge and experience of the music business that only can come from being a sixth lead on a bomb Fox drama that needs some pimping of its own. This guy isn’t exactly dreamboat material, so I don’t think anyone will take a look at him and go- wow, I need to watch Bones!! Millegan was also shilling Tuesday night on the TV Guide channel show and apparently is available for bris’ and bat mitzvahs if anyone is interested. Tori Spelling is also there, taking the night off from home-wrecking, as is John Peter Lewis, who later snuck back into one of the dressing rooms when no one was looking so he’d have a place to bunk for the night. Lance Bass is there, as well, and Matt Rogers gets pretend-gay on him. Lance says the judges are usually right in their criticism, so let’s not make him a candidate to replace Paula. Matt asks Tori who she thinks will win, who’s her “horse,” an unfortunate choice of word when interviewing the former Donna Martin. She says the last four singers were the strongest; Brandon, Brenda, Dylan and Kelly. Matt never wound up encountering any real celebrities, but then he’s Matt Rogers and who wants to talk to him?

Talk about fake celebrities, Nikki McKibbin, looking very demure but not allowed anywhere near the actual Idol stage for fear of bad luck, is doing taped trivia questions probably back in her hometown. Her first question is:

Justin Guarini has a famous cousin. Is it… Denzel Washington, Brian Austin Green, Samuel L. Jackson or Vin Diesel?

I don’t know and only three of those people are famous, but we’ll have to wait to come back from the break to find out.

We’re back and the answer is Samuel L. Jackson. I wonder how many removed he is. Probably not nearly enough according to Sam. Do you think Guarini called him up and begged to sing the theme song for “Snakes on a Plane?”

Ty Treadway is sitting down with vocal coach to the contestants, Deborah Byrd. She tells him “You must call me Byrd.” Sure thing, doll, but you must tell me why half the contestants suck. Ty asks Byrd about Melissa forgetting the words and Byrd talks about how she drummed the word “premonition” into Melissa’s head over and over and over after she forgot it in rehearsal. Yeah, that won’t make someone focus on their fuck-up or anything. Ty wants to know how much of an influence Byrd has on helping the contestants choose their songs. She says she tries to gear them toward artists that have similar tones as that particular contestant. In Kevin’s case, she found a rare copy of “Daffy Duck Sings the Hits.” However, Byrd is not allowed to come out and tell the contestants what they should or should not sing. She cites Clay Aiken as someone who constantly would ask her if a particular song was right for him, but she was banned from telling him straight out yes or no.

Byrd talks about nerves and performing on such a big stage, the stress of choosing the right song… She says the first day on the new stage, she takes all the contestants up and makes them walk across, getting used to the size and scope of it. She sounds pretty cool and I hope we get to hear more from her in the weeks to come. It’s too bad someone like her can’t be a judge.

Matt Rogers is in some green room with the cast of Fox’s newest one season flop sitcom, “The Loop.” I watched 10 minutes of this thing last night and erased it from my Tivo, never to be seen again. I did the same thing with “The New Adventures of Old Christine,” which was even worse. I don’t really care what five 20-something no-name actors and the first ex-Mrs. Tom Cruise have to say about American Idol. Now if Mimi Rogers was gonna dish about the marriage, I’m all ears. Instead, Matt asks Mimi what she thinks of Simon Cowell and keeps pulling the microphone away from her to ask another question before she can finish her previous answer. I think I may be ready for Mikalah. He then asks Eric Christian Olsen a question, but the camera never seems to find the boy’s head. We see a shoulder, and that’s it. He calls Bret Harrison “Ted”, asks more questions he doesn’t wait for answers to; at this point Kim Caldwell is looking like Diane Sawyer.

We’re only 20 minutes into the show (moaaaaannnnn). Ty Treadway is back with Justin Guarini, newly shorn hair and a new album he’s releasing independently. We see him in the studio laying down the vocal for “My Funny Valentine.” Justin says the biggest thing he learned from his Idol experience is that you have to have a very clear idea of what you want to do as an artist, because if you don’t, then someone is going to come in and make you do what they want. Like “From Justin to Kelly?” He now calls himself an entertainer-slash- entrepreneur. He’s in the Justin Guarini business, y’all. Probably cause no one else wants to be. It’s a jazz standards album. Justin says he wanted to do this kind of album because everybody knows these songs. Everyone knows “My Funny Valentine.” Umm, 1/3 of the contestants Tuesday night didn’t even know Stevie Wonder.

Matt Rogers is back and interviewing the cast of Melissa McGhee’s family. Mama McGhee said she thought her daughter got voted off because of her lyric flub and I’m starting to get tired of this excuse. It’s not as if she started speaking in tongues during the damn song. Matt tells her that she should be proud, her daughter has a lot of opportunities and doors open to her. Mom gives him a look that says- So she can be here in two years interviewing other losers like you? Melissa shows up and gives all the family members hugs. Great televisionzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. Matt asks Melissa a question and with her family so close, she finally breaks down and starts crying. Matt assures her that this is the first day of the rest of her life. Advice like that would make me want to take up drinking.

Trach-boy Anthony Federov has a trivia question for us and does not look happy to be spilling it. Which two winners of AI were never in the bottom three? I know that one- Kelly Clarkson and Carrie Underwood. I liked Anthony. Do you think Carrie has any time for him now that she’s a star and he’s Mrs. Norman Maine?

We see a pre-taped segment with Bo Bice and watch as he records his album and shoots his music video. Bo puts a positive spin on his post-Idol experience, never alluding to just what a soul crushing period it must have been. He talks about being happy having celebrity status because it means he can do things like help out Katrina victims. He’s going to use all the unsold copies of “The Real Thing,” to re-shingle all the roofs. I love Bo, I was a huge fan of his last season and I’m truly sorry for his health problems and how disappointing his CD must have been for him.

Mikalah Gordon is finally with us, getting a manicure (seriously) while spilling all the latest Idol news. Mikalah never got to go to her prom because post-Idol her schedule was too busy. My guess is she got a whiff of the pig’s blood practical joke her fellow students were planning to pull. Here are some of Mikalah’s breaking news items.

1-Kimberly Locke is Lane Bryant’s new spokesperson.
2-Josh Gracin is currently on tour (and coincidentally, shops at Lane Bryant)
3-George Huff is doing a benefit concert for something (probably George Huff)
4-Amy Adams will be starring as the narrator along with Patrick Cassidy in a tour of Joseph &The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. No word on whether dinner is included with the price of the ticket or sold separately.

Back from the break and we’re interviewing Melissa McGhee for the third time in one hour. She’s now had more screen time on this show than on American Idol total. We get to see Melissa’s initial audition in front of the judges and she sings a wobbly “Can’t Fight the Moonlight.”

Treadway brings up the whole “premonition” scandal and bets Melissa will never forget the word now. She agrees, even though she says she has no idea what it means. The poor thing. I live in LA, so I know firsthand that the city outlawed all use of dictionaries, both in book form and on the internet, so it’s understandable she’d sing a lyric without knowing what one of the words meant. NOW I believe that she was a beauty pageant contestant. Melissa says she never listened to Stevie Wonder, but also cried when she met him. She then makes more excuses about her sore throat. I’ve heard more than enough from this one. She goes on to say (about the missed word) that after her performance, the rest of the contestants tried to make her feel better and told her that she handled the flub well, that if it had been them, they would have fallen apart onstage. Well, everyone but Paris, who is so perfect that she never makes mistakes.

Treadway asks Melissa who she’ll miss most of the contestants and she says the person is already gone, that being Heather Cox. My guess is she had little success in getting Lisa Tucker to go out to trashy bars with her in a tube top and Heather was all for it.

This segment is in two parts and we’re now looking back at Melissa’s journey. AUUUUUUUUGHHHH!! Over the montage they play, replay and play some more Melissa’s off-key acapella rendition of “Can’t Fight the Moonlight” and by the third go-round, I’m BEGGING to hear “Bad Day,” by that whiny guy who’s related to Susan Powter. Melissa tells Ty that before Idol, she didn’t think a career in music was feasible, but now so many doors are open (what did I tell you about listening to Matt Rogers??) she thinks she’ll be able to go far in music. I agree. If she could just have half the career of Christina Christian or Jim Verraros or EJ Day or Nikki McKibbin, Ryan Starr, AJ Gill, Ricky Smith, Charles Grigsby, Vanessa Olivarez, The Professor and Mary Ann…well, I’m optimistic.

I’m less optimistic about this show. It’s also on probation, as far as re-caps go. We’ll see how next week shapes up. Until Tuesday, Seagulls out.