Susan Boyle’s reality show journey ended Saturday with a second-place finish to a dance troupe called “Diversity” on the final of the television show “Britain’s Got Talent.”
Scottish singing sensation Susan Boyle was dealt an unexpected blow when she lost out to a group of young street dancers in the final of the British talent show that made her a global star. Despite winning praise from the audience and the judges in her final performance on live television, the 48-year-old graciously accepted second place, saying the “best people won” and wishing the winners “all the best”. Boyle enjoyed a meteoric rise to fame over the past two months after video footage of her audition piece for the show, “I Dreamed A Dream” from the musical “Les Miserables”, was posted on video-sharing website YouTube. – From AFP
Scottish singing sensation Susan Boyle has made the semi-finals of Britain’s Got Talent where she will battle it out with 39 other acts including a 11-year-old street dancer, a woman and her dancing dog and a group of farmers who perform with a wheelbarrow. The 48-year-old spinster gathered a worldwide following and celebrity fans including Demi Moore and Jon Bon Jovi since belting out I Dreamed A Dream from Les Miserables on the programme. In a 90-minute special edition of Britain’s Got Talent on ITV tonight the judges announced the 40 acts they want to go through to the live semi-finals which start tomorrow. – from Telegraph
The 48-year-old church volunteer was speaking in the first part of a two-stage interview on the show in the US on Monday. Ms Boyle was the star guest as Winfrey was joined by TV judge Simon Cowell for a show called The World’s Got Talent. The first part was pre-recorded at her home in Blackburn, Scotland. The subtitles were added by bosses who thought American viewers would not understand her strong Scottish accent. – from Telegraph
A slick of lipstick holds an iconic place in a woman’s make-up bag – giving an instant injection of glamour on even the dullest day. And now Susan Boyle has added a tube of the red stuff to her growing arsenal of beauty products. Stepping out of her pebble-dashed home today the dowdy spinster from Britain’s Got Talent appeared to have been replaced by a respectable school-teacher type.
A YOUNG Susan Boyle missed out on TV fame 14 years ago after Michael Barrymore failed to spot her star quality.
The Daily Record unearthed exclusive video footage of Susan auditioning for Barrymores My Kind of People talent show in 1995.
Her rendition of I Dont Know How To Love Him was caught on camcorder by 18-year-old Julie Febers, whose mum Elizabeth MacLean was also auditioning.
Susan, then 33, is dressed in a cerise pink jacket, navy skirt, and smart black shoes with her long dark curly hair pinned back.
But as Susan begins to sing, Barrymore starts acting the fool and lolls about on the floor trying to get a glimpse up her skirt.
Unfazed, Susan gamely continues and cheekily tries to kick the comic with her black patent stilettos.
But she fails to win over Barrymore at a packed Olympia Shopping Centre in East Kilbride. And as she finishes, he plants a huge smacker on Susan’s lips – perhaps her first-ever kiss?
Standing just a few paces behind Susan in the audition queue was mum-of-two Elizabeth, 52, of Pollokshaws, Glasgow, who did get through with ballad The Power of Love.
Elizabeth said: “Susan was a few people in front of me.
“When she began to sing I knew she had a great voice, but Barrymore was intent on taking the mickey out of her.”
YouTube singing sensation Susan Boyle _ whose dowdy image contrasted so greatly with her angelic voice that she became an instant Internet celebrity _ has gone in for a makeover.
The economy is scary, jobs are disappearing and taxes are going up. But Britain is buzzing over something else _ Susan Boyle’s new hairdo. Some say the overnight singing sensation who rocketed to fame after a phenomenal performance on “Britain’s Got Talent” has every right to upgrade her dowdy appearance. Others fear she may lose her authenticity _ and her amazing connection with the TV audience _ if she goes too far in the image makeover department. – from Huffpo
The inevitable has happened: “Britain’s Got Talent” sensation Susan Boyle got a makeover. She’s ditched the drab dresses for a shiny black jacket, dyed her tangled gray locks a rich brown, donned a trendy plaid scarf. Should we be concerned that the woman who rocketed to fame because of the unlikely juxtaposition of average-gal frumpiness and chill-inducing vocal chops has been forced to conform to conventional standards of beauty? Or should we instead applaud Ms. Boyle for her larvae-into-butterfly transformation now that she’s on the world stage? No doubt half the Boyle-ites will be wringing their hands, while the other half sings (mostly off-key) her praises. – from MTV
The Susan Boyle Scam update! Was this all a hoax planned by Simon?! Regardless, she sure can sing. Here’s her YouTube sensation:
This isn’t to suggest that Boyle herself is a hoax (though she does seem a bit too comfortable on that stage, parrying with Cowell, to be a complete naif). But the notion that Cowell was unaware of Boyle’s existence, let alone discordant looks and talent level, before she ever took the stage, is flatly ridiculous. And the song Boyle chose – if she, in fact, chose it – so seamlessly provides the meta-narrative that it’s easy to miss how calculated it is. From “Les Misérables” (“the miserable,” the way we are meant to perceive Boyle), she sings “I Dreamed a Dream.” Boyle opens on the second stanza: “I dreamed a dream in time gone by/When hope was high/And life worth living.” In “Les Misérables,” it’s sung by a lonely, unemployed character on the fringes – just like Boyle, who sang with the undignified descriptor “unemployed, 47″ slung across the bottom of the screen. – from NYPost
Cynical New York Post columnist Maureen Callahan believes “there is something disturbing” about how quickly Susan’s modern day Cinderella story captivated the world after her humbling performance of “I Dreamed A Dream,” from the musical Les Miserables, on Britain’s Got Talent this month. After learning that judge Simon Cowell has reportedly been working on both movie and album deals for Boyle’s future in showbusiness, Callahan has become convinced that the acid-tongued mogul engineered Susan’s tale in a bid to garner ratings for the ITV series. – from Popcrunch
First of all, in order to be accepted on the show, Britain’s got Talent contestants must be true amateur performers and not have been recorded for commercial purposes before. The Daily Record however, has dug up a CD where Susan Boyle sang “Cry Me A River” as one of the tracks. The CD was for a charity organization and only 1000 copies were ever produced. – from here
After all, doesn’t this earlier recording that has been dug up sound just a tab bit … sophisticated? – from here
Internet sensation Susan Boyle, who garnered at least 30 million YouTube views with her Cinderella performance on Britain’s Got Talent, is a player in a giant fraud. – from here
Britain’s Got Talent singer Susan Boyle may not be as naive as she would have us believe. The 47-year-old spinster told viewers of the U.K. TV talent show that she lived alone, had a cat called Pebbles, and had “never been kissed.”
But it wasn’t true.
Boyle, who has competed in countless talent shows, used the line to curry favor with the audience. She told a TV interviewer from U.K. breakfast show GMTV, “That was made as a joke! Never been kissed? I’ve never stopped.”
The blogosphere has lit up at the news.
“Angel or crazy for publicity? You decide,” was how fan site CafeArjun.com responded. “I’m forced to believe it was all a planned show!”
Susan Boyle insisted she wouldn’t change after she shot to worldwide stardom following her appearance on Britain’s Got Talent. But as she stepped out yesterday it appeared she had been on a shopping trip. The Scottish singer had swapped her matronly look for a new, patterned dress and leather-look jacket, along with a pair of high heels. – from DailyMail
Should Britain’s Got Talent singer Susan Boyle have a makeover before tomorrow’s show? Be honest. Do you think she could do with a bit of lippy, a touch of frizz ease on her hair and maybe a few minutes with Gok Wan to show her how to dress?
Boyle, 47, appeared on the show last weekend, surprising the audience and stunning the judges with her rendition of the Les Miserables tune I Dreamed A Dream. Since then she’s had over 20 million views on YouTube, appeared on CBS, NBC and been duly patronised by everyone from Drew Barrymore to Demi Moore.
Lets take it as a given that our reaction to Boyle proves we are all as shallow and vacuous as Amanda Holden – after all, we get the television presenters we deserve.
“She needs to stay exactly as she is because that’s the reason we love her. She just looks like anybody who could live on your street.
“The minute we turn her into a glamour-puss is when it’s spoilt,” says paragon of natural beauty Amanda Holden, in today’s Mirror.
When Extra contacted us this morning to help them give this singing sensation a makeover, we couldn’t resist! We kept her look natural, but evened out her skintone with foundation, groomed her brows and opened up her eyes with mascara and soft grey liner.
As for her hairstyle, we tried two looks–a tousled bob and a sleek bob with bangs. Longer, sleeker hair gives her a more polished effect. I prefer the look with the bangs–they give her face more contour. – from DailyMakeover
These photos of Susan Boyle rocking a cute little dress and a hip leather jacket will no doubt have some folks crying “blashphemy!” Ever since the Britain’s Got Talent video of the frumpy, bushy-eyebrowed, never-been-kissed Boyle singing angelically first hit the Web a week and a half ago, many among the sobbing masses have lamented an inevitable post-stardom makeover. Few will blame the sweet Scottish songbird herself but will instead blame a ruthless, unfair entertainment industry that forced a woman with a hidden inner beauty to succumb to a plastic, cookie-cutter standard of external beauty. – from E!
Last weekend, Susan Boyle was just a face in the crowd.This weekend, clips of her singing on Britain’s Got Talent have notched up almost 50 million views on YouTube. Her face appears on the front pages of papers in Britain and beyond, she been offered a seat on Oprah’s sofa and has been told she is as good as guaranteed a worldwide number one album. The rise of the 47-year-old spinster from Scotland has been a true global phenomenon. – from BBC
She has been watched by more than 20.2 million people (and counting) on YouTube, Twittered about by Demi and Ashton, praised by Patti LuPone, admired by the bloggerati, snapped by the paparazzi, swarmed by camera crews, interrogated by reporters and restyled, sort of, for American television.
But now Susan Boyle, the middle-aged church volunteer whose soaring performance of “I Dreamed a Dream” on a British talent show last week turned her into the world’s newest instant celebrity, at youtube.com/watch?v=9lp0IWv8QZY, is trying to catch her breath.
Since then, the unlikely grey-haired star has captured the hearts of millions around the world – including Demi Moore and Ashton Kutcher, who posted a link to her clip on their Twitter sites.
She has even featured on America’s NBC Today Show – and moved host Kathie Lee Gifford to tears with her singing.
YouTube users from numerous countries, including Mexico and the US, have watched her on the website.
More than six million have watched one posted clip of Susan, while more than three million have seen other videos of her audition on the site.
Ms. Boyle’s amazing talent has been a part of her for a long time, just waiting to be discovered. Now it’s happened. But to put in perspective regarding what emotions seem to drive her, Ms. Boyle’s father passed in 1997, just two years before this, so I wonder if he was in her thoughts when she produced this amazing recording. I write that because Boyle said recently — on CNN’s “Larry King” — that what she sings fits the mood of the moment. – from blogspot
Watch Susan Boyle – Cry Me A River – 1999 Recording:
A 47-year-old British charity worker who says she has never been kissed has become a YouTube sensation after singing in front of Simon Cowell. Susan Boyle, from West Lothian in Scotland, appeared on the television show “Britain’s Got Talent” at the weekend. A YouTube clip of her performance now has more than 5 million hits. Before appearing on stage to sing “I Dreamed a Dream” from the musical “Les Miserables,” Boyle told the show’s hosts that she lived with her cat Pebbles and had never been married or kissed, adding that it was “not an advert. – From CNN
