NBC raises its 'Voice'
The judges from "The Voice" are, from left, Cee Lo Green, Christina Aguilera, Adam Levine and Blake Shelton. Credit: NBC, 2011
NBC delayed Thursday's "Tonight" show to air a 12-minute preview of its new series "The Voice," which premieres tomorrow at 9 p.m., thereby establishing one irrefutable fact: NBC badly wants you to watch this newbie. Should you? To the questions:
OK, why is "The Voice" so darned important to NBC?
With four boldfaced names in the judging chairs -- Christina Aguilera, Cee Lo Green, Maroon 5's Adam Levine and country music's Blake Shelton -- the network thinks it's got enough star firepower to appeal to a broad demographic base. NBC desperately needs a hit before the May upfronts, when the networks announce their fall lineups, and so this has gotten the call, as has Mark Burnett ("Survivor"), who produces.
What exactly is "The Voice"?Simple! The judges turn their backs to a performer they can't see; said performer then sings, and if the judges like what they hear, they press a button and turn around. If they all turn around, the singer gets to choose which judge he or she wants as a coach. In the next phase, the judges morph into coaches after building a team of eight singers each. They train the singers, who then go into a battle round. Some singers are eliminated before the final rounds, when viewers vote for the best. Four are left standing, and the winner gets a Universal Republic record deal and $100,000. It's based on a Dutch hit of the same name.
What does Aguilera have to say about her new career choice?
"It's definitely about going back to music where you wanted to buy it or you wanted to listen to it on the radio purely from . . . just what sounds good on your ears [or] something that moves you. . . . It's basically boiled down to something that truly moves you and that you truly connect with."
What's my take-away?
A 12-minute promo is like looking at an entire series through a straw -- but at least the initial straw-view was promising. "The Voice" manages the neat trick of being an "American Idol" clone without actually being an "American Idol" clone -- thanks largely to the gimmick of choosing talent based on voice rather than theatrics. But, as a viewer, you may feel like you've joined a baseball game in late innings. How were these singers chosen? Would talent coordinators actually have picked contestants with lousy voices? ("The Voice" is a short-run series, so maybe those questions will be answered later on.)
