LittleBigPicture: Songs of praise

Had you for a second there, didn’t we? As if we’d do an article on Songs of Praise. All those choirs singing those random songs in perfect harmony. Snore. Who wants to watch that? It’s all singing and cardigans; so wholesome and tedious. No sirreebob, this week is all about my favourite new show of the year. Despite what you might think, it's not really about the singing...

glee (E4, Mondays, 9pm)



Glee shouldn't be as successful as it is. Especially as it has a very annoying typeface for a logo. glee. It's grammatically infuriating. Add to that the fact that this is a show about choirs and cheerleaders spontaneously bursting into song, and quite frankly Glee (I refuse to use a lower-case 'g') should be rubbing shoulders with maddeningly monikered Nickelodeon sitcom iCarly on a Saturday morning. Incidentally, iCarly is one of my favourite kids TV shows of the moment and, as this gentleman explains, the Seinfeld of children’s television.

On the contrary; Glee is on primetime E4 (or primetime Fox, depending on your global orientation) and every week is watched by over 12.5 million people on TV alone. Last year, the cast had 25 songs on the Billboard 100, the most simultaneously since the Beatles at 31 in 1964. This year they won both the Golden Globe for Best Series and the Screen Actors Guild’s award for Best New Show, as well as being nominated for many other awards, including diversity groups rewarding Glee’s storylines and inclusive nature.

All of which is thoroughly deserved, Glee is a great show and the cast are very talented. But let’s have a look under the TV microscope. Is Glee’s success a case of The Emperor’s New Clothes, or is it really (as I suspect) a work of televisual mastery which should be hailed as a sign of the evolution of television.

In the name of exposition, we’re going to have a quick Glee 101, to make sure we’re all up to speed about who is doing what with who and why.
Created by Ryan Murphy (creator of the batshit crazy Nip/Tuck) and Ian Brennan (creator of, er, Glee), the show is centred on an unfeasibly talented competitive singing group – or 'glee club' – by the name of New Directions. New Directions is made up of a selection of traditional misfits, songbird sportsmen and strategically placed spy cheerleaders.



Spanish teacher Will "Not Spanish" Schuester, is their conductor and general life advisor-cum-father figure. When not leading the youth of McKinley High in song, Will is the sworn enemy of cheerleading troupe The Cheerios’ head coach Sue Sylvester (Jane Lynch), a professional sociopath. Will is also where I hit my first stumbling block with Glee.

William Schuester: Not Sexy
Firstly, Matthew Morrison is a marvellous singer – a Tony Award nominated Broadway singer, no less. I’m sure he’s a very sexy person, and he has lovely eyes. If your care to, you can google him dancing in his boxer shorts. However, Matthew Morrison's sexiness is not the bugbear I have. It's that of Teach Will Schuester.

"Schu", as they insist on calling him, is all at once too sexual as a teacher, and not believably sexually attractive to three smoking hot women. As a teacher to have a crush on, he ticks all the boxes; not too old, probably knows what an iPad is if not what it is for, and calls kids "bro". On the other hand, as a life-partner, he’s a pretty off-putting; he still reeeaaalllly wants to be Justin Timberlake (probably makes you call him 'JT' in bed), he's very invested in his collection of waistcoats and skinny ties, and knows a lot of showtunes. Off-putting, no?

But not to his crazysexy wife Terri, or to beautiful guidance councillor Emma Pilsbury (Jayma Mays). Even a woman who only cameos in an episode for two scenes spends one scene making out with him. What is the draw, fictional ladies! He’s a right player, giving innocent little Emma the big romance and then making out with the sexy nemesis choir master Shelby (the immeasurably talented guest star Idina Menzel) later that day.

On top of it all, he sings R’n’B in the earnest way that only skinny white boyband members can, and the hair... oh, the over-gelled, under-styled terrible hair. I’m with Sue Sylvester on this: "I don't trust a man with curly hair. I can't help but picture little birds laying sulfurous eggs in there, and it disgusts me."
Wardrobe
Glee's wardrobe department deserve multiple awards for their work on this show, there is not an episode goes by without someone wearing something fabulous. With this show, the outfits are almost intrinsically part of the cast.
They have splendidly caught the eccentric and precise nature of Emma Pilsbury, and done it with complete style and panache that there is an entire website devoted to What Emma Would Wear. (Of course, there is also a website devoted to Dust Bunnies, so maybe the internet’s not really that discerning). Emma’s OCD is reflected perfectly in her consistently perfect wardrobe, and she pulls off banging outfits like this mustard number:



In Kurt Hummel, Glee’s flamboyant counter-tenor and clothes horse, the wardrobe department appear to have free range. Occasionally dressed as Sherlock Holmes, sometimes in a twinset and pearls, Kurt never looks anything but fabulous. How times have changed. If Kurt had gone to my high school and dressed like that… well, let’s say he wouldn’t dress like that for very long. Happily, Kurt’s classmates are a tad more accepting and Kurt has massive balls. Look at him rock the Beyonce look: