Rule #27 in the Reality Show Guidebook (I haven’t written yet):“If a reality show contestant is shown talking about how much he or she misses his or her family, there’s a good chance said contestant will be rejoining that family soon.”
Granted, the latest girl who is no longer in the running toward becoming “America’s Top (Petite) Model” didn’t do the annoying thing where reality show participants completely break down and cry over not seeing their families for two weeks. (It would’ve been understandable, in this case, given that we were talking about missing a young child here.) Still, as soon as she pined for her kid, I had a bad feeling that she was a goner.
But we’ll talk about that slightly disappointing end result later.
First let’s talk about the rest of this mostly predictable hour, which had the models shooting their annual (train wreck-y) “Cover Girl” commercials.
Before the girls met up with “The Insider” host Lara Spencer (and her curiously low-cut dress), we saw Nicole kinda fitting in with the rest the girls. Well, except for Erin, who continued this season’s tired theme of trashing Nicole’s personality (we fear what we don’t understand). Erin reasoned that her own personality would be more appealing to a larger number of girls. Translation: “I’m more generic.”
We also learned that Laura is dyslexic. (What a coincidence that this came up for the first time during the week the girls would be asked to read from a teleprompter and write a script. Hmm.)
The girls met up with Spencer who was faux-interviewing comedian Ant. Ant helped the girls brush up on their interview skills by pretending(?) to be a bunch difficult characters ranging from “high-strung actress” to “diva.”
From there, the contestants took what they “learned” for the week’s challenge – an actual interview with “90210” star Jessica Lowndes that would be riddled with (intentional) technical difficulties. I only watched two season 1 episodes of the new “90210” so I don’t really know who Lowndes is. However, I think she deserves some sort of merit badge for patience for answering the same questions from a bunch of amateurs over and over again.
The highlights from this segment included Nicole asking the 20-year-old Lowndes (pictured, left) if she’d had a baby and Laura’s dyslexia preventing her from even realizing the teleprompter was displaying nonsense. The best part of this segment was Sundai’s reaction to the victory by Erin (who CLEARLY did the best job). After the judges praised Erin’s charm, Sundai blurted out “Erin is NOT charming at all!” in her confessional. Just what I was thinking. Either way, Erin (and two friends) earned a “beauty” photo shoot in Seventeen magazine.
Shortly thereafter, the girls got a package at the house that wasn’t shoes. Instead, it was the instructions for the week’s elimination challenge: write copy for your own 25-second commercial.
To be honest, I was kind of blown away by how well all the girls did. It’s not so much that having the girls write their own material made it easier for them to memorize it. (We still had our number of blank outs.) I was impressed by the substance in some of the commercials (Sundai talking about making the brown eye standout, Laura talking about being from a small town, etc.)
As for the commercials themselves (directed by Nigel Barker), the judges (including guest Kim Kardashian, who I suppose was there because she knows what it’s like to perform in front of a camera as an amateur) fell all over themselves praising Jennifer’s commercial, which won the top prize. I agree that it was good, but it felt a bit phony baloney to me, though it’s entirely possible I feel that way because I don’t really care for Jennifer.
By that same token, Nicole is my favorite remaining contestant and I thought her commercial was a success (unlike her straight hair at panel). After her (entertainingly) disastrous interview with Lowndes (hey, it WAS memorable!) I thought she might be in major trouble for this commercial shoot. However, besides being one of the few girls left who really knows how to model, she’s a hard worker. She recognized the commercial was something she’d struggle with and instead of going into “whoa is me” mode, she stayed up later than anyone else and worked on it. It wasn’t excellent, but it was certainly better than anyone expected. (I’m already mentally preparing myself for the day she gets kicked out in favor of someone more generic.)
On the flip side, Erin went to bed early and had a meltdown on the set of the commercial. Several meltdowns actually. She was joined in the bottom two by Rae, who had a REALLY rough time of it this week. Rae’s commercial was simply uncomfortable to watch, as opposed to entertainingly bad, like Brittany's cyborg impersonation, Sundai’s audition for “Pitchmen” and Laura’s aw-shucks performance.
In the battle of alien-looking bleach blondes, Erin was kept over Rae, who wasn’t standing out enough in the crowd. Though Erin has a fresher look, I have a feeling Rae is a better model. Oh well, at least now she gets to go home and be with her baby.
So what’d you think of this episode? Have you ever seen Ant and Mario Cantone in the same room? Were you happy to see Teyona? (I was just relieved to see last cycle’s winner ANYWHERE.) Who is the worst winner in “Top Model” history? (For me, it’s between last night’s Top Model in Action Nicole and Teyona.) Finally, does Tyra seriously think that 1 plus 1 equals 3? (What was THAT about?)
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