It could be that the hundreds of shivering, sequin-clad people belting out Top 40 covers at Invesco Field at Mile High on Sunday morning want to change their lot in life.
Among the starry-eyed, eager-to-please young people clamoring to be the next “American Idol” was a biology major from Fort Collins, a Costco clerk from Salt Lake City and a single mom from San Francisco.
About 600 people showed up Sunday for the wildly popular TV program’s “cull auditions,” either to take a stab at going to Hollywood or to cheer the hopefuls on.
There were hours of predawn madness before auditions started – the spontaneous burst of a Pat Benatar song shrieked from a bathroom stall, the mom curling her daughter’s hair on the concrete floor by the hot dog stand.
But from this amateur disarray emerged a common sliver of hope – be it minutely small and horribly intimidating – that they, too, could rise above and be the next rags-to-riches singer – the star who can later say he or she once practiced singing in a football stadium bathroom before being discovered as the next Kelly Clarkson, who won the show’s first season.
“In some ways, I think this is easier,” said 22-year-old Ashlee McGarry from Utah, who was applying touches to her makeup. “I think it’s better than living out of your car and trying it that way.”
“American Idol” is basically a national prime-time talent show. Denver was one of several cities where Fox officials are searching for talent.
Final winners get a music- recording contract.
Sunday’s winners move to the “executive producer” auditions today and Tuesday.
Those winners face the three celebrity judges, who will decide who gets to go to Hollywood. The “American Idol” phenomenon, which started in 2002 – and now draws tens of millions of viewers each week – has drawn criticism from many established musicians.
Some worry the show highlights everything bad about the music business: cut-throat competition, commercialization and a tightly controlled contract by Fox Broadcasting.
Some hopefuls auditioning Sunday agreed.
“I guess you just pick your battles when you’re doing this,” said 23-year-old Kevin Hill from Aurora, who is a waiter at Old Chicago. “This seems like the opportunity of a lifetime.”
Kimberli Gunn, 21, of Mesa, Ariz., advanced to the next round knowing that judges like the package.
“They want the stories, the look and the personality,” said Gunn, who sang a Whitney Houston cover in a strapless coral dress.
A disappointed Tamar Haviv, who didn’t advance Sunday, wondered aloud what it takes.
“A lot of people who’ve won look like Hilary Duff and Lindsay Lohan,” said Haviv, 28. “What do I have to do? Bleach my hair and lose 50 pounds?”
American Idol officials declined to say Sunday how many people showed up to audition and how many made it to the executive producer cuts.
“It’s about talent, not numbers,” said one official, who didn’t give her name.
As the day wore on, disappointment was more common than excitement.
Some hopefuls cried; some were downright indignant. Those who didn’t make the cut tended to huddle and seethe together, sometimes a few feet away from “winners” giving media interviews to “Access Hollywood” and “The Tonight Show.”
“This is so cheesy,” 26-year- old Alicia Polite of California told two other women who didn’t make it.
“I’m not going to stop because some girl who looks like Buffy the Vampire Slayer gets a chance and I don’t,” she said. “I wanted to be on TV so someone could see that I’m different, that I have an attitude.”
Staff writer Allison Sherry can be reached at 303-820-1377 or asherry@denverpost.com.
