Singing hopefuls and screaming girls
Reporter’s notebook: At this week’s live taping of ‘Rising Star,’ a group of TV execs crowded into the studio along with hormonal teenagers clamoring for a moment with Assi Azar
Debra writes for the JTA, and is a former features writer for The Times of Israel.
The teenage girls waiting breathlessly in the studio for the start of the live taping of “Rising Star,” a singing competition that is Israel’s newest and biggest reality show, seemed to have missed the memo that host Assi Azar is openly gay.
Azar, who made it onto OUT magazine’s 2009 list of the 100 most influential gays in the world and who in 2011 unveiled his own documentary on coming out, was unfazed by the girls screaming his name while he filmed a few quick promos and practiced reading from the teleprompter on Tuesday night at the “Rising Star” studios in Neve Ilan, outside of Jerusalem. When he stepped off the stage and came down to say hello to the crowd, however, the already excited girls lost their composure entirely and swarmed toward him, all angling their smartphones for a photo. One girl, a brunette of about 14, couldn’t control herself and hurtled toward Azar, managing to knock down the barrier between the audience and the stage and falling onto her head. She was examined by a medic, and Azar, taking pity, posed for a photo with her while she rubbed her temple.
The crazed girls were in the front section of the live audience for Tuesday’s show, the 13th episode of the first season of this groundbreaking program which brings the audience directly into the action, thanks to an integrated app that calculates results live. They were joined in the audience by a group of VIP visitors from the INTV Conference, the second annual confab on integration in television hosted by Keshet, the media powerhouse behind “Rising Star.” Among the guests were TV executives from France, Denmark, and the UK, as well as entertainment journalists from both Europe and the US.
“Rising Star” has been a major success for Keshet, smashing Israeli viewing records ever since its premiere in September and earning international distribution deals with Italy, Germany, Russia, France and Scandinavia. Others are said to be in the works, and no doubt some of the executives on hand for Tuesday’s taping were checking out the show with an eye toward international distribution.
After popping into the trailer outside where a team from mako.co.il, Keshet’s Internet arm, monitors the voting results from the show’s integrated app, the group was led to a nearby boardroom to munch on sandwiches and get a rundown of the program from Keshet VP of Programming Ran Telem.
Then it was into the studio, where the stage was awash in blue light and the contestants were lining up for a series of one-on-one duels.
Despite its global appeal and innovative software, however, “Rising Star” proved on Tuesday that at its core, it is a quintessentially Israeli program.
Among the finalists singing their hearts out were Dondit John, a Sudanese refugee who chose the peace anthem “Salaam,” complete with steel drums; and Aryeh and Gil Gat, ultra-Orthodox brothers from Jerusalem who play electric guitar and have been dubbed “The Singing Rabbis.”
