Abstract
In 2009 contestant Susan Boyle on ITV1’s Britain’s Got Talent became an overnight household name. Posted on YouTube, her audition for the programme (broadcast on 11 April), for which she sang ‘I Dreamed a Dream’ from the stage show Les Misérables, had millions of hits.1 From being an invisible nobody, she became a highly visible, globally recognised somebody. The rags to riches narrative of talent shows or their pop star equivalents like The X Factor are generically encoded. The idea that ordinary people can get to live the celebrity dream is what underpins the shows’ huge appeal for contestants and spectators alike. Hence, in one sense there is nothing remarkable about the media frenzy surrounding contestants: this is only to be expected in the production of reality TV stars. However, in Boyle’s case the media attention was extraordinary and highly remarkable in a way that singled her out from other overnight-celebrity figures.
Keywords
These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.
Buying options
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Learn about institutional subscriptionsPreview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Copyright information
© 2013 Elaine Aston and Geraldine Harris
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Elaine (2013). Age Liberation: Susan Boyle, ‘Grumpy Old Women’ and Virginia Ironside’s Monologues. In: A Good Night Out for the Girls. Performance Interventions. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137300140_4
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137300140_4
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-349-32799-7
Online ISBN: 978-1-137-30014-0
eBook Packages: Palgrave Theatre & Performance CollectionLiterature, Cultural and Media Studies (R0)