The Xtra Factor

9:30pm – Sunday, November 21 on 7TWO

LIVE

Go behind the scenes with host Natalie Garonzi to capture all the instant reactions to The X Factor’s on-stage action. Natalie takes viewers backstage for an exclusive look at the ups and downs in the aftermath of the live performance and results shows once the cameras have stopped rolling on The X Factor.

8:30pm – Sunday, November 14 on 7TWO

LIVE

Go behind the scenes with host Natalie Garonzi to capture all the instant reactions to The X Factor’s on-stage action. Natalie takes viewers backstage for an exclusive look at the ups and downs in the aftermath of the live performance and results shows once the cameras have stopped rolling on The X Factor.

8:30pm – Sunday, November 7 on 7TWO

LIVE

Go behind the scenes with host Natalie Garonzi to capture all the instant reactions to The X Factor’s on-stage action. Natalie takes viewers backstage for an exclusive look at the ups and downs in the aftermath of the live performance and results shows once the cameras have stopped rolling on The X Factor.

8:30pm – Sunday, October 31 on 7TWO

LIVE

Go behind the scenes with host Natalie Garonzi to capture all the instant reactions to The X Factor’s on-stage action. Natalie takes viewers backstage for an exclusive look at the ups and downs in the aftermath of the live performance and results shows once the cameras have stopped rolling on The X Factor.

Last night, Throng attended the live recording for the X Factor Results show at Fox Studios in Sydney. Both the performance show and results show are aired live for those states on eastern daylight savings time.

The audience for the show meets outside the studios at 6pm. The audience is a mix of general admission and VIP guests. VIP guests include friends and families of the contestants as well as guests of Fremantle Media, Channel Seven and others associated with the show.

Soon after 6pm, guests are progressively moved in, going through a series of holding areas. X Factor staff marshal guests to their respective areas, making sure that all seats are filled as empty seats do not look good on TV.

The usual rules of being in a TV studio apply – no smoking, no drinking, no taking photos, no recording of any form, mobile phones turned off. That doesn’t stop many from taking pictures of the stage or sitting there social networking on their phone on Facebook, Twitter or the like.

The studio itself is not that big. The stage takes up about half the space they have available, while the audience is just a few hundred people. The stage has an impressive light show – itself worth over a million dollars for sure. Those moving heads used a made by one of the industry’s top brands – Varilight – and are worth at least $15,000 each – and there are about 100 of them in total. Then there are the LED screens, the LED bars, the fog effects, and more.

Like most TV shows – whether live or pre-recorded – there is a warm up act there to keep the audience interested while nothing is happening on stage – like before the show, and during commercial breaks. At X Factor, Dave Eastgate was there to entertain – and entertain he did!

Dave, who has previously done work for So You Think You Can Dance, got on the mic and started interacting with the audience. He made comic remarks about the quality of signs people have made for their favourite acts. As you would notice from watching the X Factor on TV – some fans go to a lot of trouble for their signs – with works of art that would get them full marks in high school art. Others – not so good – a few pieces of A4 paper stuck together with sticky tape.

While Led Zeppelin was playing in the background, he hit the air guitar. He then got a child up from the audience to do the same, before asking all children to come onto the stage. Next thing you know, there’s 30 kids up there rocking to Led Zeppelin. Junior X Factor has arrived! Now there’s an idea for a show – Junior X Factor – kids 8-12. Could work! Fremantle Media – interested?

Host Luke Jacobs appears on stage just after 7pm to record promos for the nights’ show which are used both in ads on TV and as part of the videos they show throughout the show. Meanwhile – the crowd was wondering why there were only three judges chairs set at the judges table.

Maybe Guy was off to LA again? Ronan was busy? Natalie had an accident? Or Kyle was sick again. Rumours spread, questions were asked, but we were not told anything. We found out the same time everyone else did as part of the live show.

Dave egged on the crowd to give the best cheers ever for the promo recordings. He continued to entertain right until the producer called 20 seconds. Off he went, and the show started. Within the first minute after the opening sequence, we all found out that Kyle was sick. Boos from the crowd.

Luke announced what was happening on the show. Top 8 will become 7. Short Stack will perform – and – what most of the crowd were waiting for – Adam Lambert – by far the most successful act to come out of American Idol in recent years, despite not actually winning the year he was a contestant.

If you think the screaming is loud on TV, you should hear it live in the audience! By far the loudest screams were for Adam Lambert, although fans dedicated to their favourite X Factor contestants are a force to be reckoned with.

Judges are introduced, then, after a stuff up from Luke that saw him first say the judges were about to perform, then Top 10, the top 8 performed the traditional group performance show opener. After a break, Short Stack cam on to perform their hit, Planets.

Later, the top 8 were brought onto the stage to be put through the process of announcing were was safe and would therefore appear on Sunday night’s live performance show. Altiyan was announced first, then Mahogany, Luke & Joel, Sally and Andrew. Hayley, India and Mitchell were left standing as the last three – who would have to wait until after Adam Lambert performed before finding out which two would have to sing for their lives.

With Kyle not present, Mitchell was left standing on his own. Hayley signalled for him to come over and stand with herself, India and Natalie. On TV, you didn’t see Hayley invite Mitchell over – just Mitchell standing next to her.

During the break the stage was readied for Adam Lambert and his band. The glitter drum kit was rolled out, performers took their places, and, then as the show returned from the break and after the announcement by Luke, Adam Lambert’s performance began to a massive cheer. Many of the crowd were upstanding and dancing straight away. Those that were not, quickly got up by the time the chorus of “If I had You…” was reached.

Another break, more entertainment from Dave, and the stage was cleared ready for the business end of the show. The remaining three contestants were brought onto the stage with Natalie. Luke announced Hayley was safe, leaving India and Mitchell. Judges comments were along the line of being surprised, and even questioning who was voting for the show.

Mitchell performed first, and had a huge following in the crowd, there was one section in particular on their feet and screaming for him. He worked the crowd well. Then it was India’s turn. Natalie returned to her seat just in time – no doubt she had been with India prior to her performance readying her to sing for her life.

India then performed – and while there were a number of fans in the audience, they weren’t on their feet like they were for Mitchell – although Bitter Sweet Symphony is more of a put your arms up and sway song then anything else.

Judges made their choices. With Kyle absent, there was already a vote against India as Mitchell was one of his boys. Then Guy chose to send India home as well. Natalie, of course, chose Mitchell. Ronan could not decide, so he took it to dead lock and let the public’s decision determine who was to go home and who was safe.

Mitchell was announced as going home, India was safe. Confusion reigned at the judges table – as Natalie was unsure what just happened. It looked like the judges expected India to go home. Being the bottom two for the second week in a row seemed to play on India’s mind as she appeared to be expecting to be sent home. One time earlier in the show when she walked off stage, she had her head down and seemed sad.

All contestants were brought onto the stage again, and many hugs followed. Mitchell was in tears as his X Factor counterparts one by one comforted him. This continued into the Xtra Factor – which starts immediately after the X Factor finishes. Luke was there for the start of that show as well.

Seeing the contestants on stage consoling Mitchell, and knowing his X Factor dream is over is much more of an emotional moment live at the show then it is conveyed onto TV. You can feel his sadness.

As the first ad break went to air for the Xtra Factor, the audience is asked to leave.

The X Factor is a Fremantle Media production for Seven.

The X Factor – Sunday and Monday nights on Seven at 7.30pm. Encores 7TWO next day.

The Xtra Factor – After the X Factor on 7TWO.

For general admission audience tickets, go to www.xfactortv.com.au. They are usually available two weeks in advance.

Now what is it with the X Factor results show finishing 15 minutes late?

We have all come to expect that shows will finish a few minutes late – especially when live – but when 8.30 becomes 8.45, it’s a bit of a big ask just to sit back and take it. It can mean that people recording shows after or later in the night will have the ends of them cut off, if they were unaware that the X Factor finished so late and don’t think of compensating their recordings to make up for it.

Finishing at 8.45 would not be so bad, if the EPG reflected it. Last night it didn’t. Nor did it on Sunday night. Seems Seven’s usually accurate EPG gets forgotten on X Factor nights. Wonder how many people missed the end of the Event or Covert Affairs as a result?

Then – the problem transfers over to 7TWO. With the Xtra Factor airing on 7TWO after the X Factor, it cannot start until the X Factor finishes. So that ends up running late, then if they don’t finish on time – as seems to be the case with anything live – then 7TWO programming ends up running even later – in fact, on Sunday night, I noticed the Xtra Factor still going 25 minutes after it should have finished.

I am not a big fan of one hour results shows for reality competition series like the X Factor. Idol last year, dumped their results show. There is no need for results shows to go one hour, let alone another 15 minutes on top.

When I played it back last night, I fast forwarded straight to the bottom two performing, then watched the final result. All done in less than 15 minutes. I didn’t feel like I had missed out on anything. My opinion though – there are obviously people that enjoy these shows, as the ratings reflect – although I am sure Seven would be hoping for a lot more than just a million watching each show.

Problem is, if they keep on running their programming so late, it will start impacting on later shows. We shouldn’t have to set our recorders to record the next show or with ridiculously long overruns just because they can’t organise live shows to finish on time.

I could say the same about the NRL Grand Final on Nine, but that is a one off major event. X Factor is on twice a week, every week.

After watching back the X Factor last night, I decided to give the Xtra Factor a go on 7TWO.

Even though Seven had not updated their EPG for the night, leaving X Factor set to finish at 9.30, it was clear it would not finish to around 9.45 as that was the time the Xtra Factor was set to start on 7TWO.

I had reasonably high expectations for the show. The PR about it suggested there would be discussion, behind the scenes interviews and footage, a rotating panel of experts and some more time to learn more about the contestants.

From the start, the show seemed heavily dominated by host Natalie Garonzi walking around shoving a microphone into people’s faces and talking a million miles an hour. People she spoke to were hardly able to get a word in, and there seemed like off talking from her than anybody else. The number of times she used the word “Everybody…” or “Your Top 12” or “Your judges” started to make it look like she was killing time.

When the judges came to the special Xtra Factor studio we had been told about a number of times, both Natalie and Kyle were absent initially. Natalie turned up, saying she had been to the toiled – not sure if we needed to know that. Kyle never made an appearance on the show.

The Xtra Factor encouraged viewer interaction by phone, SMS, Twitter or Facebook. Calls were even put live to air. Titles on screen showed twitter and SMS comments but regularly showed the same tweets a few too many times.

Overall, the experience felt more like something you would see on Community TV, and just seemed to bring down the X Factor experience. Perhaps it was simply too much to watch another hour more about a show that had just been on for over two hours?

I think the concept of the Xtra factor is not a bad idea, but its delivery really needs some work. Although I think the show would do better just being on the Monday night only after one of the contestants has been eliminated.

Problem is though, right now it is only live to the eastern states, and then once daylight saving begins in two weeks, only viewers in NSW, ACT, VIC and Tas will be able to participate live in nay case.

In terms of ratings, it didn’t make top 50 shows for the day, not even the top 100 which means less than 100,000 ended up watching – not even 10% of the audience who watched the X Factor itself.

Maybe as the competition hots up, there may be more interest in viewers talking about the show after it.

As for the first Xtra Factor, I’d give it 3 out of 10.

What are your thoughts? Did you watch it? Did you know it was on even?

The Xtra factor airs on 7TWO, right after the X Factor airs on Seven, Sunday and Monday nights. Also encores on 7TWO in the afternoons, after the X Factor afternoon encore.

Source: Ratings OzTam. Top 100 reference: TV Tonight.

Please note, I am no longer keeping this post up to date as the number of reads compared to the work involved does not make it feasable anymore.

You can see what is on 7TWO at yahoo TV, yourtv.com.au or other internet guides including the ICE TV guide here on Throng.

Due to ongoing and regular massive last minute programming changes, I will be keeping the TV guide for GO up to date. Also alot of people view it daily.

At this stage, I have no plans to do the same for any of the new channels 7mate or GEM. Again you can find out what is on these channels via your favourite internet TV guides.

7TWO Highlights, updated September 20, 2010.

Packed to the Rafters 1st Season – Sundays 5.00pm until Sept 19.

That 70′s Show – moves to 7mate from Sept 25. 6pm Sat Sept 25, 6pm Sun Sept 26 and then 7pm Mon-Fri from Sept 27 on 7mate.

Flsuhed Out – Sunday Sept 26, 6.30pm

Family movies – Sundays, 6.30pm

World’s Strictest Parents – Sunday 8.30, Sept 26.

The Xtra Factor – Sundays, 9.00pm, after the X Factor airs on Seven . Also Mondays 8.30pm. Encores Monday and Tuesday afternoons around 4pm and 3.30pm respectively

Heartbeat – Mondays, 7.30pm & Saturdays 7.30pm.

October Road – Mondays, 9.30pm from Sept 20.

Mistresses – Mondays, 10.30pm from Sept 20.

Fawlty Towers – 7.30 Tuesdays from Sept 14.

The Vicar of Dibley – 8.05 Tuesdays from Sept 14.

Benidorm – 8.45 Tuesdays from Sept 14.

Not Going Out - 9.15 Tuesdays from Sept 14.

Garry Unmarried – 9.30 Tuesdays Sydney and Brisbane and Perth ONLY.  Final ever Sunday Sept 26, 8pm for Syd, Bris and Perth. Melb Adel get season 1 final then.

The Sopranos – Tuesdays, 9.30pm Melb, Adel. Double eps (10.30 Syd and Bris and Perth). Check local guides for exact times, it varies.

The Royal – Wednesdays, 7.30pm from Sept 15.

McCallum – Wednesdays, 8.30pm from Sept 15.

Wycliffe – Wednesdays 10.40 from Sept 15.

The Black Donnellys – Wednesday nights 12 midnight. Not Sept 22. Final Sept 29.

Family movies – Thursdays, 7pm.

The Professionals - Thursdays 11pm or so

Eli Stone – Thursday nights, midnight after The Professionals

Airline USA - Monday, Tuesday, and Fridays (not Sept 3), 7pm. Also Wednesdays from Sept 15. Back to S1Ep1 Friday Sept 17.

Ghost Whisperer – Fridays, 7.30pm.

Escape to the Country – Fridays 8.30pm.

60 Minute Makeover – Fridays 9.45pm.

The Great Outdoors – Fridays 10.45pm.

Doctor Finlay – Saturdays 6.30pm

Heartbeat – Saturdays 7.30pm. Mondays 7.30 as well.

Cracker – Saturdays from Sept 25, 8.30pm

The X Factor Encores – Mon and Tue mornings 6.25am as well as around 2 or 2.30pm Mon and Tue afternoons.

Some programming updates sourced from TV Tonight. Full up to date TV guide for 7TWO can be seen at www.yahoo7.com.au

7TWO can be seen on digital channel 72 and 127 Foxtel (Sydney, Brisbane, Melbourne). 7TWO also available through 7QLD. 7TWO now on Prime – 7TWO on Prime can be seen on channel 62 in Prime digital areas of regional NSW, ACT and VIC.

9:45pm – Sunday, September 19 on Seven

THE ULTIMATE COMPANION TO X-FACTOR

Natalie Garonzi chats to the contestants, and the judges with audience interviews, exclusive behind-the-scenes and backstage access.

Featuring a rotating panel of experts from radio, newspapers, magazines, television and the music industry.

9:45pm – Sunday, September 19 on Seven

THE ULTIMATE COMPANION TO X-FACTOR

Natalie Garonzi chats to the contestants, and the judges with audience interviews, exclusive behind-the-scenes and backstage access.

Featuring a rotating panel of experts from radio, newspapers, magazines, television and the music industry.