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Commentary: On the ‘Idol’ beat

I put on a black tie Thursday morning to commemorate the loss of somebody who’s been very special to me in my brief career with this newspaper, a man whose exploits began about the same time as mine, but who I now leave behind: Phil Stacey.

Stacey, a musician third class with the Navy Band in Jacksonville, Fla., was a contestant until Wednesday night on “American Idol,” the ubiquitous “talent show” that has materialized into a combined masterstroke of show business, marketing and public relations. The show’s genius, whether deliberate or not, is that it’s so popular that it’s impossible to ignore; indeed, it’s so popular that anybody linked with it, including local reporters, become more popular for the link. So in addition to having the monumental P.R. resources of Fox and News Corp. behind it, “Idol” seeps inescapably into local newspapers as reporters get into the act by covering hometown performers making good (or not) on the show.

We have kind of a special circumstance at Navy Times, because we’re a “local newspaper” that readers pick up anywhere from Boston to Bahrain, but, when Stacey made his first round of “Idol” cuts, we had a dog in the fight just like The Daily Snooze of Anytown, USA. I’ve followed his career with reporters in Jacksonville; in Tennessee, where he went to college and his parents live; in Kansas, where he went to high school; and even Oklahoma, home of his wife’s family. Everybody wants a taste of “Idol.”

Stacey and “Idol” weren’t a beat I thought I’d relish. Although I’d been trapped into seeing bits of a few episodes over the years, I’d deliberately never watched the show before; “too popular,” I sniffed. My background and aspirations in the news game were for “serious” reporting; sticking microphones in the mayor’s face; poring through little slips of paper at the Library of Congress; slamming down phones and yelling “rewrite,” etc. Now I’d have to devote two nights a week to covering this guy with the shiny head?

But I’d underestimated how diverting the “Idol” department could be: Who knew this would be a season that viewers would hand the show and its legions of followers an existential crisis? As weeks passed and Stacey’s fellow contestant Sanaja Malakar stayed on the show despite his inability to carry a tune or remember lyrics, Idol Nation had to confront the show’s central conceit — its currency is popularity, not talent. Unlike, say, “America’s Next Top Model,” in which eliminations are made by a blue-ribbon panel of bitchy fashionistas, “Idol” is at the mercy of anyone with a telephone. Nothing new for longtime viewers, but I was discovering it all for myself.

To my amazement, people around the newsroom began asking me about “Idol,” either to catch up on a week they missed or test their theories about who they thought would be cut. I began to develop a rhythm on Tuesdays and Wednesdays; I scoured blogs and “Idol” columns in Navy Times’ big sister newspaper, USA Today. I tried to figure out how many different flippant, alliterative ways to describe somebody whose head is totally bald, and it’s fewer than you think.

Now that’s all over; Stacey has been eliminated. The contest will go on, sure, and Fox will anoint another one-in-a-million nobody with a fat recording contract, in true Horatio Alger fashion, but that’s not my department anymore. Although I’m certainly not comparing myself to him, I think I know how H.L. Mencken must’ve felt when William Jennings Bryan died. And now I’ve got to figure out what to do with myself on Tuesday and Wednesday nights.

Related:

Interview: Stacey, ousted, relaxes but unsure what next