Any Dream Will Do

Ah, it's that time again. It's Saturday night and my TV is tuned to the BBC's Any Dream Wil Do yet again, with a few Malibu and pineapples to help me through.


Rob McVeigh sang Bruce Springsteen's Born to Run in a leather jacket! Maybe he thought he was on Grease is the Word on the other channel. I like Rob a lot, but he's been given a hard time by the judges over the last few weeks and, even though he sings well, Lord Webber keeps saying that he just can't see him playing Joseph and, if he doesn't like you, you haven't got much of a chance, which must affect Rob's confidence. Someone who doesn't lack confidence is Daniel Boys, who sang Rod Stewart's Maggie May. Daniel has been criticised for being too nice previously but instead of developing some attitude, he'd just grown some stubble. He's still obviously the favourite though, he's simply so professional, you'd trust him to carry a show for you. He could make an effort and sex it up though.

Lewis Bradley sang The Monkees' I'm a Believer. During the week, his pushy mom came around to talk some sense into him as he'd lost his confidence over the past couple of weeks. His mom was having no nonsense and kept saying "How much do you want this?" Not as much as her it seemes, she came across as a bullying stage mother, living her life vicariously through her mediocre child. There was a funny bit after his song when presenter Graham Norton asked him how his life had changed during the competition and Lewis said that he'd never farted so much! Um, I don't think that was the life affirming answer Graham was looking for. Stroppy Lee Mead was fed up last week and revealed during his taped introductin that he'd wanted to leave, so this week he rather appropriately sang Will Young's Leave Right Now. Oh, but I thought he was out of tune and hoarse throughout, however the audience seemed to like it. They must be very easily pleased, just like the judges. Lord Webber said he was "awesome" and sourpuss vocal coach Zoe said he was very good too, which just smacked to me like they wanted to make sure they kept their favourite Joseph in the running.

Craig Chalmers sang This is the Moment from Jeckyll and Hyde and, as usual, he just stood still and sang stiffly into the camera with no interaction whatsoever with the studio audience. Doesn't he realise that it's a competition to be in the theatre? He livened it up a bit towards the end but it was still pretty bad. Luckily, he'd laid off the fake tan for once and didn't look quite so Oompa Loompa this week. He's still got those oddly pale pink lips though. The judges said he was good and Craig just stood there and cried and cried, fer chrissakes. Shame he doesn't bring the same emotion into his performances.

In his pretaped interview, Ben Ellis amusingly bitched about Lord Webber and complained that he flows hot and cold. Ben sang a Tom Jones number, Just Help Yourself and camped it up fabulously with the two sequined Josephines. Graham showed a brief video clip of Ben when he was a kid, being kissed by a girl at school. You can always tell when the producers want to really keep a contestant in as they choose to show a sentimental clip just before they get the judges' comments. Next up was last week's surprisingly strong performer, Keith Jack. This week in rehearsal, Keith's job was to butch up and act a bit older. Keith sang Elvis's Always On My Mind. He'd been dressed up in a suit and sang well, but oddly chose to cry throughout his song which just made him look like a petulant child, which kinda went against the intention of trying to show a more mature side.

They ended up with a hilariously bad group number, The Kink's You Really Got Me. Ah, it brought back happy memories of Sanjaya Malakar. They tried their best, bless 'em, but they just looked like a bunch of virginal boy scouts. The only two Josephs with any sex appeal at all are clearly Ben and Rob. Denise Van Outen seemed keen though, no surprise there. I bet she's stuck fast to her seat and has to be prised off after the show, the dirty bitch. You know she's only on the show to get a new boyfriend.

There's always a filmed piece just before the results and the mission for the Josephs this week was to learn how to be a cocky bastard when playing Joseph, so who else was going to teach 'em than our very own cocky, bastard judge John Barrowman. Oh, but it was pathetic, with little Keith crying, Craig failing to even push the others in pretend anger, but Ben and Lee did well. Ben especially stood out in a little spat with Lee which tipped over from acting exercise to getting personal.

There was no separate results show tonight because of the Eurovision Song Contest taking over the schedules so we had the sing off straight away. The bottom two in the sing off were Rob and Lewis. They had to sing Tell Me It's Not True from Bloodbrothers. Poor Rob sounded very nervous and looked thoroughly pissed off. I think he knew it was his time to go as he's never had much praise from Lord Webber. Usually, the guys sing really well in the sing off but they were both pretty poor and very pitchy this week. Given the option, I would've kept Rob, the show needs his testosterone. Lord webber obviously prefers a nancy boy as he saved Lewis. Poor Rob. It was nice to see his Joseph coat finally removed at the end so we could see his manly physique. It made a change from some of the skinny chickens who've left over the past few weeks.