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Elysia Villanueva pouts after not being selected.
Some walked away in tears. One woman collapsed and was carted away on a stretcher. And the lucky few got one step closer to Hollywood!
More than 15,000 American Idol wannabes auditioned for the hit show’s producers Tuesday at the Izod Center in the Meadowlands. The few hundred that got picked will get a second audition. Those survivors will then go before Simon, Randy and Paula.
“I am so excited I’m just trying to contain it,” said Christopher Bingham, 20, of Wauseon, Ohio, who wowed the judges with a rendition of “Gallery” by Mario Vazquez.
“I’ve wanted to do the show since it started.”
Others weren’t so lucky.
“I feel hurt,” said Jyreek Ellerbe, 21 of the Bronx, who sang “Yesterday” by Shanice. “They rejected me. I don’t think I was a bad singer. I honestly don’t.”
Some rejects exited the building in tears. One collapsed. Another distraught, tearful women harrumphed, “They’re not looking for good singers. They’re looking for an image.”
The Bronx’s TeaQue-N Thomas, 27, took her defeat in stride.
“I sang and they felt I wasn’t needed for this season,” she said after performing “Feel the Fire” by Stephanie Mills. “They don’t know what they’re missing.”
The frenzied crowd began to queue outside the arena at midnight but security told them to come back in the morning. Registration ended at 8 a.m.
“I was about to start sleeping on the sidewalk,” said Ed Love, 21, of Mastic, N.Y., who arrived at 3:30 a.m. but eventually bedded down in a hotel.
Tony Jackson, 23, was the last contestant to register at Gate A at 7:58 a.m. “I was running here,” he said. “You see my sweating?”
Jackson performed Kelly Clarkson’s “Beautiful Disaster” but didn’t make the cut.
The cattle-call of contestants had no more than 30 seconds before getting the thumb’s up or down.
“They cut me, man. They cut me,” said Daniel Monge, Jr. of Yonkers before vowing, “I’ll be back. I’ll be back next season.”
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