Neither of us were intending to watch the 'Miss Turkey' Beauty Pageant last Monday night... that sort of thing isn't our cup of tea. But when we heard that a few of Turkey's most popular pop-stars -- Tarkan among them -- would be performing at intervals between beauty contest segments, we were curious. So, at "Show Time" we switched to the STAR TV channel.
The first pop-performer was Emre Altuğ, doing a very credible job in English with "Tonight, Tonight" from "West Side Story". Then it was Hadise's turn with her international hit-song "Stir Me up", also in English. So when Tarkan finally appeared in a Frank Sinatra-style pork-pie hat, singing and dancing to a selection from his new all-English Album "Come Closer", the novelty of hearing Turkish pop-stars performing in foreign tongues had worn off. And it didn't help that his act lacked its usual spontaneous excitement -- seeming too well practiced...bordering on being unenthusiastic.
Not surprisingly, the sophisticated high-society audience-reaction was decidedly reserved...polite, but a little distracted. Certainly not effusive enough for an International Mega-Star of Tarkan's reputation (nor for these highly-touted new musical offerings of his -- which had been 10 years in the making). This was not his crowd.
It's not that his performance was bad. Far from it. And, after the Beauty Pageant was over, he could barely fend off the throng of well-wishing fans and reporters blocking his way from exiting the TV show-center. But we couldn't help wondering what the audience-reaction might have been if he'd performed the same musical-set in front of a younger, more-receptive group of people.
Still, a comparison could be made on that particular night between the dullness of Tarkan's performance and the dullness of the Beauty Pageant -- which was won, predictably, by a clone of most beauty contest winners these days. A tall brunette with skinny legs.
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