New Reality Show Marries Best Aspects Of Office Culture, Bad Karaoke
Who of us hasn't stumbled upon an episode of NBC's America's Got Talent, and, between savoring Hasselhoffian critiques of an armpit-playing barbershop quartet, thought to ourselves, "This show would really be onto something, if there were just some way to lower the incredibly high talent bar set by its contestants." Well, look no further than CBS' new reality show pilot, Singing Office, where they're banking on viewers showing up in droves to find out what happens when someone hands a microphone to Debra from Accounting:
In every episode, "Singing Office" surprises the staffers at two companies who are asked to do impromptu singing auditions [...]
The best five singers from each office are flown to Hollywood, where they are trained to perform a fully choreographed two-minute song-and-dance number for a studio audience. At the end of the episode, the studio audience chooses the better "singing office," whose team wins a cash prize.
"Everybody knows people at their office who stand up at the Christmas party and sing karaoke," said the show's producer, Laurie Girion. "This is a show for these people."
We doubt there will be much of an audience for Singing Office, beyond perhaps a small sub-faction of America's cubicle-monkeys tuning in for the vicarious thrill of cheering on their fellow slabs of data-entering desk meat. We think the show's producers are focusing on the very least entertaining aspect of office Christmas parties, however, and would fare much better with a show that brought together the nation's most disgruntled employees, got them wasted on seasonal hooch, then had them compete before a panel of judges in the categories of "telling off their bosses," "playing grabby-ass with the intern," and "passing out in puddle of own vomit."
