Did Brooke White's Lyrics Goof Cost Her the American Idol Title?

You can't help but like American Idol Season 7 contestant Brooke White. You can't help but root for her and feel obliged to cheer her on; you can't help but be happy for her successes and feel empathy for her stumbles. Early on in the competition this season, I identified her as a favorite, if not a possible dark horse contestant, or even a diamond-in-the-rough front-runner potential. I love her beautiful, rich, smoky alto - there's never been anyone who sounds quite like her in all seven seasons of the competition before - I love her genuine, megawatt smile and fresh-faced, lovably awkward appeal. She's just so egregiously earnest and nice and sincere that I'm half convinced that if you don't like Brooke White, you're just probably a bad person.

The problem with that is, last night, I didn't like Brooke White's performance of the Evita movie soundtrack add-on, "You Must Love Me," sung for Andrew Lloyd Webber night. This brings me to an uncomfortable cognitive dissonance - I'm probably a bad person - but that's neither here nor there. The sad reality is, Brooke White might have just blown her entire run on American Idol in three seconds flat.

You see, I don't disagree with Simon Cowell's after-commentary that it's natural human instinct to want to start over when you've dropped the lyrics. I think most people would have done the same thing in her shoes, and I think most people watching at home will understand that. But I also don't disagree with Paula Abdul, in that it's live television, and ultimately, the true earmark of professionalism is that the show must go on. Even as a sympathizer/ fan, I cringed as Brooke started over and remarked to my family watching with me that she was probably gone this week as a result, and the strained, deer-in-headlights performance that she delivered immediately after that didn't do much to redeem her. It was the strangest thing - audibly, her voice has never sounded clearer or stronger. If you watched the performance with your eyes closed, it was an emotive, poignant delivery. But with your eyes open, well, she was clinging to that microphone for dear life, and she looked terrified. Awkward.

I think that, had this kind of gaff come on the back of a consistent, strong run on the show, the audience at home would have been ready to forgive her and sympathize with her natural human mistake, and like it did for David Archuleta before her (who had a similar lyrics fiasco earlier in the season) her very real talent and charisma would have been enough to carry her through another week. But I am not sure that, in such a tight competition and after such a weak run these past couple of weeks, Brooke will find audiences as forgiving as they could be. Then again, as I said, Brooke is an eminently sympathizable person; how much so remains to be seen when the votes come in.