After a four-year break, comedian Peter Kay triumphantly returned to television with a one-off special skewering talent show competitions. The improbably-named Britain's Got The Pop Factor And Possibly A New Jesus Christ Superstar Strictly On Ice was a riotous send-up of X Factor and its predecessors, where three fake finalists sang for the approval of judges Pete Waterman, Nicki Chapman and "Dr" Neil Fox, presided over by host Cat Deeley…Peter Kay (who stars as transsexual Irish singer Geraldine) co-wrote and directed this special; his knack for embellished but truthful characterization, eye for detail and musicality ensuring this wasn't the half-hearted pastiche we've seen before. It was a living, breathing, believable television show and twice as entertaining as the real thing.
All of the expected talent show elements were present and correct: the bizarre and hopeless auditions (featuring Siamese twins of unequal talent, and an elderly Sugababes tribute act) and "boot camp" (whisked to St. Tropez… caravan park), before the finalists were chosen -- toothy "R Wayne" (who was originally turned down; the news killing his gran), "2 Up 2 Down" (a quartet with two wheelchair users), and the aforementioned Geraldine.
The meat of the special was the final itself, with a surprisingly adept Cat Deeley giving a credible performance that didn't break the illusion (even when asked to say they'd had 37 million phone votes, and there was just 6 votes separating the winner!) The judges (a real-life triumvirate who had dominated the format with Popstars before Simon Cowell took grip) were also very good, although slightly stiff at times. But seeing them try to one-up each other's comments and wrangle the most strained metaphor was great fun, and painfully true of how the judging role operates.
Even better, the performances were perfect exaggerations of elaborate X Factor-style stage-acts. 2 Up 2 Down were dressed as superheroes and hoisted around on wires, R Wayne sang a love song to his dead grandmother, Geraldine mixed "Free Nelson Mandella-ella-ella" into "Umbrella-ella-ella" by Rihanna. Most of the performances were medleys of astutely-chosen pop cheese; from Shania Twain's "Man I Feel Like A Woman" (tranny Geraldine's choice, natch) to the hits of Bewitched and Steps. We even glimpsed a "skills week" that had R Wayne singing Stevie Wonder's "Ebony & Ivory" with a black ventriloquist doll, and Geraldine doing "The Frog Chorus" with croaking toy amphibians.
The little touches were just as fun: viewers asked to press the purple button, acts were unable to get off the stage so regularly lingered at the edge out of shot, dance choreography lessons came from Lionel Blair, and there were cameos from Sir Paul McCartney (playing the Home & Away theme tune on his piano), Rick Astley, "Michael Jackson" (asking a dwarf contestant "how old are you?"), Andi Peters, and the Cheeky Girls as efficient, knowledgeable and short-tempered singing mentors!
Overall, it might have been better to schedule the results show the following day, as 105 minutes of intense parodying was slightly overwhelming (even with a 75-minute break in the middle), but this was otherwise a spot-on appropriation of talent shows that fulfilled its aim. It wasn't cruel, it was celebratory and affectionately done. But it also reminded us how false, manipulative, shallow and rehearsed this brand of reality show can be. In some ways these shows are beyond parody already, but I think Kaye did a decent job of taking it to plausible extremes. Can you watch the real X Factor finale without wondering if the winner will choke on silver confetti now?
What's more, unlike X Factor, it had the good grace to bow out after just one episode instead of drag on for months. Mind you, Peter Kaye couldn't resist releasing a tie-in novelty song ("The Winner's Song", co-written with Take That's Gary Barlow); a catchy ditty released in shops today. Given Kaye's previous success with comedy records ("Amarillo"), prepare to be driven insane by overexposure.
This was a superb television lampoon that sneaked up without much pre-publicity from Channel 4 -- which was a shame, as I don't think we'll see anything funnier this year.
12 October 2008
Channel 4, 8pm & 10.15pm
