In this age we live in of Andy Warhol’s predicted fifteen minutes of fame being gifted to anyone with the lack of inhibition to make a tit of themselves on vacuous ‘talent’ shows, it’s often worth remembering that this isn’t an entirely new thing. There are the likes of Opportunity Knocks and New Faces, in which there was a few notable winners among the spoon players and dog acts that just wanted to be on television, but they were the only two. Nowadays we have X-Factor, The Voice*, and various different copycat versions. Aside from that, it is now possible to become famous just by appearing on a fly-on-the-wall type programme. If you don’t believe me, Joey Essex appeared in Celebrity Big Brother.

*It’s easy to distinguish between The Voice and X-Factor; in one show the judges turn their backs on the singers before they start singing, in the other show the judges wait until six months after the final.

However, there was one light entertainment giant that won hands down when it came to pandering to the delusional, Stars In Their Eyes. Good old Challenge TV has added this show to their schedule and we watched a couple of episodes last night. For those that don’t know, the format was simple; an ordinary member of the public dresses up and sings a song by their favourite pop star and is judged on how well they sound like the original. At best this is a game show for children, but throughout the 1990s this was one of ITV’s biggest hitters on the Saturday night light entertainment front.

I know that there are people who make a living by spending their evenings by pretending to be someone else, but it isn’t exactly an overcrowded business I imagine. In my opinion, tribute bands are the lowest form of entertainment, so maybe I’m slightly biased. The judges on X-Factor do at least have the honesty to turn people away who haven’t quite got what it takes, although a lot of shit still manages to get through, but they can’t be accused of offering false hope in the same gung-ho fashion that Matthew Kelly dished it out.

“You won’t be a toilet cleaner after tonight because you’re going to be as big as the person you’re going to be”, was the sort of lie that Matthew Kelly used to feed to these well meaning but usually rather simple contestants. The weird thing is that I didn’t watch these two episodes and see anyone who went on to become a big star, although they might be huge in tribute circles, I just wouldn’t know. The best people on the show are the ones who genuinely seem to see Stars In Their Eyes as a springboard to fame and fortune. Last night we saw a young man who apart from a desire to go on television pretending to be Curtis Stigers was a singer/songwriter/musician with his own band. He stated that his ambition was to make it big with his band, and Kelly told him he would. Who is Matthew Kelly to go around incorrectly predicting the future for these poor fuckers?

This gave me a brilliant idea for a sequel show in which all past contestants (participation is compulsory) return to the show and tell us exactly what has happened in their show business careers since they first appeared on Stars In Their Eyes. I would wager that the toilet cleaner didn’t make it to Wembley Stadium, unless they needed a cleaner.

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