The fall’s big network singing competitions begin this week, with three episodes of “The Voice” and two of “The X Factor.”
Beating them both to the punch is “Broadway or Bust” (PBS, 8 p.m., check local listings), which is not so much a competition as it is a documentary of a contest for high school musical theater students from across the country.
Executive producer Laurie Donnelly says the national High School Musical Theatre Awards – or Jimmy Awards – are looking not just for singers. “They’ve got to sing, they’ve got to dance and they’ve got to act,” Donnelly told reporters at the TV Critics press tour this summer. “And yes, they have to do it all at the same time.”
Fifty thousand students enter the competition; by the time they get to New York City, they’re down to 60 finalists for what she calls “an intense week of theatrical boot camp.”
They perform solo and in ensembles before a series of judges from Broadway.
“It was absolutely surreal,” says Joshua Grosso of Florida. “It was a humbling experience.”
And it was far from one of those other TV singing competitions.
“I don’t think it’s so much about the competition,” says project director Kiesha Lalama. “This program itself is really about education and process. So it’s not as if you can just enter this competition to win something. It really is about the educational process and growing and learning. So it’s a whole different kind of aspect compared to something along the lines of ‘American Idol.’ It’s a completely different program.”
For one thing, it only lasts three hour -long episodes.
PBS president Paula Kerger said the existence of “Broadway or Bust,” or other recent new series such as “Market Warriers” doesn’t mean the public broadcasting is turning to reality programming in a big way.
“Broadway or Bust,” she said, “s just a great way to actually showcase the talent of young people. What I’m hoping out of ‘Broadway or Bust’ is that not only is it of interest to a broader audience who want to watch talented young people who are all really at the top of their game really aspiring to be the best, but what I’m hoping it actually does is really encourages young people to think about the arts and to think about their own participation in it and what it means to really try to shoot for the stars, and that’s what that project was really designed to do.”