Posts from — July 2009

It is Top 14 tonight and who will go? I think this is one of the best season’s ever for dancers. When will we see Jason Gilkison or Kelley Abbey. Does anyone else think Nigel Lythgoe wants the ballerina to win. In fact I think he fancies her.

Who Mag has an elimination interview with Ryan who was eliminated from Project Runway Australia with Amber-Renae this week.

He had these things to say:

He did not like fellow evictee Amber-Renae:

You’ve got other people like Amber, who got voted off the same time as I did and we were kind of mortal enemies in the house, we didn’t really have too much left over for each other. There’s absolutely nothing that stops her [Amber] talking about herself, this never-ending publicity machine about how fabulous she is in every possible way. You can just imagine living with someone that doesn’t turn off, I got into the habit of just referring to her as “The Queen of hot-air and no substance.” All pretty packaging – no good products.

On Michael aka Tresemme apparently he has got his reality TV persona honed:

Then you’ve got Michael – he’s actually a really lovely guy when you get to sit down and talk to him but then a camera turns up and he turns into the hair-flicking monster that you see on TV.

On William apparently he is a little dull:

You have somebody like William where basically his personality is like a short-circuit loop where he’s got a certain amount of jokes, a certain amount of stories and smart comments which is really funny and amazingly new when you start but when you’re locked up in there for long enough you hear the same shit again. It’s just telling the same stories to the same audience.

Who he wants to win:

From a design perspective, I think Anthony would be amazing because he lives in his own little wonderful world where most designers actually have to challenge themselves to get beyond the connection. He’s just marvellous, fabulous.

He also said that talking to Henry Roth took 45 minutes this challenge – which is amazing they must edit a lot out, as it is about a minute on TV. It is a fair chunk of time out of a 8 hour challenge.

If you want to see the episode online go here.

A regular commenter on this blog the witty and droll Wurstsemmel contacted me to ask me if I had heard the rumour of Kyle Sandilands to be one of the celebrities on MasterChef this October. He would tick all the boxes, a genuine celebrity and a Channel 10 personality with a current TV show on air, as Australian Idol will be starting next week. But can he cook? Does that matter?

Anyway will they still want to go with him after this week’s controversy? Probably as everyone will tune in to see him being given a dressing down by George and Gary. As usual the mantra that any publicity is good publicity will prevail in this case.

Speaking of George Calombaris popular mummy blogger Domestic Goddess on L Plates has found a picture of George with hair. It is a pearler and I would not have recognised him. Click link to pic here..

Also speaking of mummy bloggers there was an article on The Punch called the rise of the mummy blogger. And for the interests of disclosure I wrote it wearing my other hat as a mother.

Because we only get to see one episode a week you don’t realise how intense  The Amazing Race must be to compete in. You finish a challenge which can take up to 24 hours or sometimes more depending on where you are flying, and then you only get 12 hours to get any sleep. I reckon by the end of the first week the teams must be crazy with fatigue. I wonder if they take sleeping pills as their body clocks must be totally out of whack.

Tonight’s the teams had to fly to Munich, Germany, and then get to Ruhpolding to get their next clue. After the teams left the pit stop they asked their taxi drivers to use their mobile phones to book airline tickets. This confused me, as previously I am sure they have not been able to book tickets by phone or over the internet prior to getting to the airport. The rules must change all the time.

Margie and Luke, the mother and son deaf team,  were first to leave the pitstop. They did not use a phone but managed to get on the first flight out which was the Swiss Air 7.10am flight. The short stuntmen who had been running third were not quite so lucky and were on the next flight leaving at 8.45am.

They had  cars to drive from Munich to Ruhpolding. I am always surprised there is not more accidents when they are driving considering they are tired, stressed and have no idea where they are going.

 Tammy and Victor, the asian brother and sister were first to get on the cable car.

At the top of the hill there was a roadblock called Whose ready to fly like an eagle?

One person from the team had to paraglide down the mountain. All well and good, except the wind was to strong to do so. The other option was to run down the mountain which would take an hour.

 Tammy decided to run down.

Mel of the father/son gay team did not have the option of running down the hill as he had done his groin in and he knew he would not make it.

His son Mike was not looking happy. I loved the way they edited so it looked like once Mel started talking about God that some sort of divine intervention occurred and the wind dropped, and he went from last place to fifth.

The teams then had to get to Schonau Am Konigssee. At this stage Tammy and Victor were leading, with Margie and Luke coming in third. Margie was second off the mountain which was pretty good considering she was not second to start the run.

Linda the hillbilly woman took a wrong turn when walking down the hill and got completely lost arriving at a road. She kind of fell apart after that. She then got a lift back to the cable car place. I wonder how much assistance she had from the producers/camera men to get back into the race. I read in an exit interview that she sent four hours on the mountain.

At Schonau Am Konigssee it was Detour time:

Balancing Dolly – The contestants must ride a Segway along a 2 mile obstacle course; or

Austrian Folly – The contestants throw pies  at a target which is their partners face until they get a pie with a cherry filling.

Tammy and Victor only threw about 8 cakes before they got the cherry filling, as did Kris and Adam. Luke and Margie were throwing them for ever,

The two black sisters had map problems they were lost twice in this episode, and they were getting on each others nerves.

Victor and Tammy finished the detour first and made their way to the pit stop at Schloss Hellbrun. Mel and Mike came in second.

Did  anyone else notice they flashed up the time of 14 hours since the leg of the race started. I have never seen that before.

Back at the cake throwing tent, the flight attendants were trying to find the wood cutter. One of them  tried to salvage the fact that they looked like complete bimbos when they finally found it by saying ”we have got stop looking at things so literally.”

The Hillbillies were eliminated who collapsed in a heap of tears when they found out they were the last to get to the mat.

Here is an nterview with Steve and Linda here.

It looks like Nine once again loses to Seven on the reality TV stakes. Currently they are going head to head on Wednesday nights in the all important 7.30pm timeslot.

The World’s Strictest Parent’s on Seven had 1.595 million viewers, and Australia’s Perfect Couple: 762,000 on Nine. Last week it had 798,000 for its first episode.

What will Nine do pull this one and replace it withh Two and a Half men or 20 to 1?

With Australian Idol starting next week, Lisa Mitchell  who was on Australian Idol in 2006, proves you don’t have to win to go on to have a music career, and a creditable one at that. After the show she turned down some record contracts as she did not want to be “manufactured”. She has previously put out an EP, but tomorrow she releases her first album called Wonder. If you like folksy pop I am sure it will be a great buy.

She is also touring in August. The tour dates are here.

Crikey’sFirst Dog On The Moon bizarre brand of humour takes a swipe a Kyle and Jackie O.

If you had not realised Anthony Capon was gay he confirmed it by saying “I don’t dress men, I undress them,” as he mistakenly thought they might be designing for some AFL footballers.

However, they were headed towards Melbourne Zoo where the challenge was to work in teams of three to design a cohesive collection inspired by an animal they had been given. Each designer in each team must take ownership of an outfit. And the clanger? Two people were going to get eliminated one from each losing team.

They were able to pick their own teams. When this happens in these reality TV show you wonder if that old school anxiety of whether you were going to get chosen last would occur. Well hopefuly Ryan has none of these  memories, as no one wanted him. Ryan was trying to get in the William/ Anthony group. But like school boys they grabbed Mark and turfed Ryan to Kelly-Anne and Yopie’s team. They were not thrilled to have him either.

The teams had eight hours to complete the challenge. Michael aka tresemme said the most intelligent thing he has said all series when he said “Fuck off. Eight hours to design three cohesive outfits.” They also  only had 15 mins to purchase materials and $70 each.

Team William were allocated the lions. There vision was high fashion.

Team Michael went to the Butterfly enclosure, and  their vision was the lifecycle of the butterfly.

Team Kellie-Anne had zebra’s. And they had no vision or none that I could see except for the colour’s of black and white.

Kellie-Anne and Ryan were at loggerheads. Ryan thought it was the Kellie-Anne show, and did not like being dismissed by her. But seriously his designs over the past two weeks have been below par.

Yopie thought the fabrics Ryan was picking were cheap, but I am not sure she told him that. I find Yopie talks big and tough to the camera, but was not saying much when it came to giving opinions to her team.

Though she did get snarky with Michael when he took “her ” mannequin. 

Kellie-A nne has perfect managerial skills – dictatorial, did not listen, and when it was all going pear-shaped started laying the blame elsewhere.  She also changed her design without consulting her team members. Henry Roth, the mentor, when he came around for a preview of the designs told her she was being passive-aggressive (another great managerial trait), because she kept on muttering that as everyone is responsible for one design she did not want to make a decision that may impact on someone to going home .

Henry told them to get it together and get some theme running through the team. Ryan who kept on saying he was a team player changed his pants for a skirt which resulted in him having time issues. 

After this the other contestant’s were teasing Ryan by saying he was Kellie’ Ann’s bitch.

Arthur Galan was the guest judge for this week’s runway show, and here are my thoughts on the pointy end of the episode:

• Michael has got to throw out all his mother’s Harold Robbins books as his design’s always look like they stepped out of one of his novels.
• I loved the design’s of the lion team, particularly Mark’s, but I hated the beige  colour of the team.
• In team Zebra to me Yopie’s was the only one that fulfilled the brief in my opinion. Ryan’s looked like officewear which was sold at Portmans, and  Kellie-Ann’s eveing dress was just dull and unoriginal.

For team Michael the judges like the idea of the butterfly’s life cycle, but Arthur Galen said Michael could have had the dress as an explosion of the second outfit.

Sarah did not like the execution of Amber’s dress nor the knee length. Jayson Brundson thought it was two dresses in one.

The lion team Jayson loved he said “this looks like fashion” . The only criticism was the hood of William’s jumpsuit.

The zebra group were told it was not cohesive, and came in for a large amount of criticism. The fact that Kellie-Ann had grey on her dress and a lot of it and the others didn’t was queried. Ryan started singing like a budgie and  backgrounded the judges about the whole group dysfunctional dynamics.  Kellie Ann just kept repeating her mantra how everyone was to take responsibility for their own outfit, when she was asked about her leadership skills.

Unsurprisingly William’s team won, and Anthony won the challenge overall so he will have immunity next week. Personally I preferred Mark’s short skirt and jacket.

Sarah Gale was scathing of Amber’s she said it was outdated and she did not like the knee length, and  Kirsty Hinze thought it was more bondage than buttefly.

Kellie-Ann’s gray skirt was disliked by Arthur Galen. He said “The gray skirt killed it for me. ” The judges hinted that if two could have gone from Team Kellie-Ann they would have.

As they were doing the eliminations it amused me that Lauren looked so relieved when she was told she was safe. Didn’t she have immuntiy this week?

Amber was eliminated Kirsty saying the  ”Dress was stuck in the past”. Amber thought she was a strong designer but not a strong dressmaker and she thinks that was what let her down.

Ryan was eliminated thank God. Though I woul do not blame him for felling a bit bitter and twisted about it “He thought Kelly-Ann should have been.”

Amber Renae took her last opportunity to spruik at the camera, talking about how the show was only a platform for her “And this is not the last you have heard of Amber- Renae.”

It would appear Australian Idol judge Kyle Sandilands has shown a total lack of judgement again in a morning segment of his radio program on Today FM with Jackie O.

They were interogating a 14 year old girl about whether she was having sex and taking drugs, when she revealed she had been raped when she was 12.

The revelation occurred in a segment where they attach people to a lie detector. Yes I know I don’t get it either. The full story is here in the Daily Telegraph.

In response to her telling them about this traumatic event Sandilands asked “Right, is that the only experience you have had.”

What I also find amazing is the mother had coerced the girl to go on this segment as she wanted to find out if she was sexually active, and/or taking drugs? Why would you put your child in that situation? Also the mother said she knew about the rape. I wonder if she thought any current behaviour issues may be related to that traumatic event. I this lady needs to go to her local library and get a parenting book out. Last time I looked lie detectors were not a recommended communication tool, nor going on breakfast radio is a great way to find out what is going on in your child’s life.

Apparently DOC’s are investigating. This mother sounds like a skank, and I will be doubly disgusted if she got paid to do this.

On the other side of the coin, why does the radio show think it is OK to allow a 14 year old to be questioned about their sex life. There radio licence should be reviewed and suspended for a period of time.

Kyle Sandilands is licking his wounds and feeling sorry for himself.  He said, “I’ve certainly pissed off a lot of journos over the years but I’m sad that they’are using the rape of a 12-year-old girl to have a go at me.”

He, or his publicist and I suspect it is the latter has also written a contrite piece on The Punch.

The girl needs to sue the station and then use the money to divorce her mother. And Kyle Sandilands with Jackie O need to examine what they think is appropriate radio, the disturbing thing is their’s is the most popular breakfast radio program in Sydney.

Well my hand has to say well and truly down, as at the moment every second post on this blog seems to have some MasterChef Australia hook in it.

But it would also appear the other commercial stations want to jump on the MasterChef Australia bandwagon with Channel Seven appearing to be commissioning a cooking show.

The article on http://www.news.com.au/entertainment/story/0,28383,25851637-10229,00.html says:

A Seven executive is quoted as telling B&T Today that the network intends to have its own cooking program by the end of the year in direct competition with the show that was a ratings juggernaut for Ten.

“The Seven executive confirmed it will launch something competitive in the market that will present a challenge to Ten’s series one success,” the magazine reported online.

Also Channel Nine are also working on a cooking show called The Great Aussie Cook-Off.

Thankfully Arena TV will start screening Top Chef Master’s  next Thursday 6 August at 7.30pm. Top Chef: Masters is an American reality competition show. In it, culinary professionals compete against each other in weekly challenges – a contrast from Top Chef, which features chefs that have been called relative “culinary amateurs”. MasterChef Australia took some aspects from this show for their challenges eg the wedding challenge.