Let's sing a deal

The line between talent contests and game shows, always a little blurry, is about to get pretty near invisible with The Winner Is. This project from John de Mol's Talpa Media USA combines a singing contest and deal making abilities. Simon Cowell meets Monty Hall, you might say.

The format description from the Deadline story:

The contestants will be judged by an in-studio panel led by a celebrity judge. After every singing duel round, each contestant will have the chance to negotiate a deal before hearing their fate. If they have doubts about how they have measured up against their opponent, they can leave the show — in exchange for the instant cash that round is worth. But if they’re confident they performed better than their opponent, they can await the jury results to see if they’ve made it to the next round. The amount of money each duel is worth increases with every round.

That would be an easy choice for me, given my singing non-abilities. Any money offered to me would be gratefully accepted. But I can see how things might get interesting for contestants with higher opinions of their vocal talents. Predictably, the top prize is a million bucks.

I've resisted covering talent contests like American Idol on this site, even though you could argue that they're "game shows" of a sort. They're at least competition shows, and some sites like Game Show Newsnet cover them as if they were those famous "shiny floor" game shows like Jeopardy or Wheel of Fortune. (Now that I think about it, the floors are pretty shiny on those shows.)

This new de Mol format sounds like an attempt to bridge the gap between traditional game shows and straight-up talent contests. We'll see how well it works. NBC plans a run for midseason or next summer.