This week on ABC’s Primetime, former fallen Idol contested Corey Clark alleged that American Idol Judge Paula Abdul took him under her, uh, wing, and taugh him how to mold himself into a more credible Idol contestent while having an intimate relationship with him. or :smack: ?
So what does everyone think? Can the 22 year old be blamed for going along with the whole thing? As he described it he was dirt poor and c’mon it WAS Paula Abdul here. Judge or not she would have been awfully hard to resist. Can he really be blamed for what happened?
What about her? Yes she had a reponsibiltiy as an Idol judge. But how seriously can we really take this infotainment stuff anyway. Ultimately, all of the tough decisions were in the hands of the viewers and he started flirting HARD with ther from day 1, and any idiot could tell he was hitting home from seeing her react to him the very first audition.
So is it all a tempest in a g-spot? Or should we get all indignant because she is older and famous and he is not.
You can find some documentation of this by running this google search:
Ot you can go to the abc Primetime website. Primetime is running part 2 of this series next week, if Paula’s lawyer’s don’t make them chicken out first.
It does’t matter if I care or not about whether it happened (because I really don’t laughs), -but- if it did happen, it’s highly unethical and to be honest about it, both of them should have known that, and known better. One is equally to blame as the other IMHO - I guess some would shoulder maybe a slighter majority of the blame on Paula Abdul, with her being the celebrity and older than Corey, but come on now, he was 21 or near to it. It seems like his parents were aware of something going on - -they- should have known too, DUH!
Which leads to my point - - I am tired of these so-called reality shows! I think they’re -all- a load of bunk, honestly, there’s not much that actually is “reality” in them. This is one TV trend that I would be glad to see run it’s course, like the “Who wants to be a millionaire” trend a few years ago, but it doesn’t seem to be waning just yet. Frankly, when I watch TV, I want to be entertained by stories - I don’t necessarily want to watch people competing to win money, especially when they have to do crazy stunts like what they have the contestants eat gross stuff or even do potentially life-threatening things (Fear Factor - geeze I abhor that show!!!). At least they took off that show where they play really mean tricks on people - I can’t remember the name of it now, but I kept thinking that one of the contestants was going to go postal on them and start whacking people, that’s how mean the “tricks” were. Yes, even the Amazing Race show aggravates me - the contestants are racing and chasing all over the world, being mean to themselves and each other, and look who is in the lead now - Rob and Amber, “refugees” from other “reality” shows! Not to mention that they are the best looking contestants …
Ah well … I realize I’m in the minority and I’m not even in the big-money demos age that the tv networks count, so I guess I just have to grit my teeth and find shows that I actually do like for entertainment. And to get back to the OP, the main point was that it is very unethical for something like that to go on, and if it did, both parties should be equally to blame. Sure he didn’t win, but geeze it sure seems like he had a definite edge that the others didn’t have.
Eh? Do you mean that it was during when America voted? 'Cause she was a judge. Though whether they are actually judges or rather commentators when “America votes” is open to debate.
We were discussing this at work the other day and the consensus was that most of us would be willing to have sex with Paula Abdul if it would advance our careers.
Nemo, you and your cronies are selling yourselves short. You could probably get Britney Spears or even Debbie Gibson, other hasbeen wunderkind. A Twofer for a Threeway!
I don’t know what the big deal is either. None of the things I’d normally be upset about in this type of scenario are in play here.
She was in a position of power over him? Nope.
He was underage? Nope.
He was coerced? Nope.
She had the power to influence the outcome of the contest? Nope.
He won? Nope.
About the only even remotely illicit thing I could find was that she’d be biased in favor of him, and I say BFD to that. They’re supposed to be biased and stir things up. That’s the only reason they’re there!
I’ve seen real outrages. I know what a real outrage is. This is nothing.
No sense taking chances. I’ll sleep with all of them. And Sheryl Crow, Jane Weidlin, and Liz Phair too - just in case. And Tyra Banks, so that I’ll have modeling to fall back on if I still don’t make it as a singer.
You don’t want to get me started on how many actresses I’d sleep with for a part in a movie.
I have my doubts American Idol (aka: Karaoke Idol) is a real competition. Considering it isn’t, Paula isn’t really a judge. Then it would just be one actor bumping another.
Personally I think it is a staged event to drum up interest in American Kar…er… Idol.
No, it wouldn’t be a non-issue. But I don’t believe that their relationship was sexual, or that he’d been to her house.
Clark’s story is wildly inconsistent. He claims that she gave him a cell phone, then says there were numerous calls back and forth from his parents’ landline.
He says he kept their alleged affair secret from everyone, even his family and friends, then claims his family and friends can back him up because they knew about it at the time.
He claims she bought him an ensemble at Fred Segal to wear in the semis, but the outfit he wore in his semis performance doesn’t look like it came from Fred Segal, and his only proof was a cash receipt.
The only phone message that was played back on the ABC special was ambiguous, and could just as easily have been Abdul’s warning to Clark not to comment on her also-alleged drug problem.
As I said in an earlier thread, I think Clark is just trying to garner publicity for his lame-ass album. And he’s going after Abdul because she’s an easy target. Her behavior is so erratic, you could throw anything at her and there’s a chance it would stick. But I don’t think this will stick.
Plus, ABC teased the viewing public. If you’re going to “blow the roof off American Idol”, tell us whether or not the phone lines are distributed evenly. Tell us about how the order of performances is arranged to put favorites in prime spots. Tell us whether or not it’s a coincidence that less-favored perfomers “can’t get clearance” for songs that they’d knock out of the park. And like that. One weak accusation does not an expose make.
Like Dio said elsewhere, the guy’s probably scum, and it doesn’t matter to me if Paula likes screwing scum. All that matters to me is that it was in her power to influence whether he got to the final twelve. If she favored him over the twenty-four who didn’t make it and assisted him in appealing to the other judges, then those twenty-four were unfairly eliminated.
No, it wasn’t in her power to get him into the final 12. Advising him on his hair and wardrobe, even if she did do that, would be of little import, since she’s hardly regarded as a fashion maven. And AI has a stylist, even at the semifinals level. Corey claims that Paula urged him to choose a Journey song for his semis performance, on the grounds that that would impress Randy, but a) it’s hardly a secret that Randy was in Journey; Corey could have come up with that on his own and b) it wasn’t up to any of the judges at that point.
Prior to this season, there were 32 semi-finalists, who performed in groups of 8 each, followed by a Wild Card round, in which one contestant was voted in and the three judges pick one contestant each. Corey was voted into the final 12 from his semis group, and Trenyce was Paula’s wild card. (FTR, Simon chose Carmen, Randy chose Kimberly Caldwell, and Clay was America’s Wild Card.)
The only way Paula could have engineered Corey’s advancement in the competition would be if she insisted on putting him in the final 32 over the objections of the other judges and/or the producers. But Corey claims that they did not begin their alleged liason until after the final 32 had been chosen. Anyway, maybe perspective has made me cynical, but I remember the season 2 semifinalists as being pretty much equally shabby. Perhaps Paula undermined all 31 of Corey’s rivals, so he would be slightly elevated?
I just don’t see how, even if Corey was telling one consistent story and it was completely true, Paula’s advice would have had any merit. I also don’t understand why he would want to drop a dime on someone who he claims helped him. He did mumble something about her having promised him $2 million to establish his recording career, but I doubt Paula has $2 million to throw around. At any rate, if he really was exploited in some unbearable way, he should have lodged his complaint in court, or at least with the producers. This is slander, plain and simple. (Or is it libel? You know what I mean.)
or :smack: ?