The producers of American Idol hastily booted major-label refugee Joanna Pacitti from its semifinalist pool early yesterday morning, after the final Hollywood Week episode, complete with Pacitti celebrating her victory, had aired on Fox affiliates around the country. Why did the show’s higher-ups wait so long to give Pacitti the hook, given that many of the people making those decisions were, presumably, the same 19 Entertainment employees with whom she enjoyed close relationships? Ryan Seacrest has a theory! Although it’s sort of faulty.
During last night’s episode of American Idol—which, thanks to its mansion location, had a weird sort of Joe Millionaire feeling to the proceedings—major-label refugee Joanna Pacitti was shown as making it through to the circle of 36 semifinalists, while Felicia Barton, a Virginia mom and “bar singer” who also sings in her church, got sent packing. But when the official press release announcing the semifinalists went out and Fox updated its official site, Pacitti was out and Barton was in, and Fox put out a cryptic note saying that the powers that be had deemed the “Let It Slide” singer officially ineligible for the competition. What happened?
American Idol‘s premier antifan site Vote For The Worst has got its hands on what it’s claiming is this season’s group of 36 semifinalists—i.e., all the people who made it through the Hollywood Round (which airs next week) and onto the big stage, where they’ll be held up for scrutiny in front of text-message-ready Fox viewers. Tireless Idolblogger MJ has a page with links to the chosen ones’ auditions here; I’ve also placed the names of all 36 “lucky” ones after the jump. Surprises: It’s Osmond-free! Non-surprises: Joanna “major-label refugee” Pacitti and Von “I was famous on YouTube for being a white boy who screams songs” Smith are on it.
Yesterday, two pieces of distressing American Idol-related news crossed the transom: First, word that the Tuesday night episode had an eight-million-viewer week-to-week drop (although I wonder if that was because a lot of eyeballs got leeched away from Obamamania on ABC); and second, this year’s results shows will be back to their bloated hour-long length and up against the full hour Lost (?!??!?!!). (Argh, Fox, you told us they’d only be 30 minutes! Booooo!!) The Idol producers decided to celebrate this news with… an episode that opened with a hopeful emerging from a Porta-Potty, and went right into a girl with really bad eye makeup and a startling British/Southern accent.
In preparation for giving my weeknights over to yet another season of American Idol, I’ve been reading up on the rumored contestants for the coming season, and how many of their names will be vaguely familiar. Rumor has it that we’ll be seeing a Castro (Jason’s brother), an Osmond (Donny & Marie’s nephew), and a former Miss New York crossing our TVs during the early episodes of Season Eight. But one name that probably won’t stick out to a lot of people is Joanna—as in Joanna Pacitti, a singer who was outed by The New York Post as a formerly frustrated Annie who had an ill-fated dalliance with Geffen not even two years ago.
