–Could be a toss-up between Delisha, Euphoria

IT wasn’t an entirely smooth performance, but Delisha Wright continued to be the brightest thing shining on local talent show “The Spotlight”, as it wound down to the semi-finals with Episode 9 last Wednesday night.

If you missed the episode, here’s what’s up: It’s now down to the final three, and people are probably seeing dollar signs and thinking about just how they are going to spend this $2.5M grand prize.
As host Faizal Khan continues to remind us, “That’s a whole lot of ‘Grangers’!”

The final three are Delisha, singer Trevaun Selman, and three-man dance troupe, Euphoria.

Guest judge of the hour was none other than the ever-conspicuous Joel Ghansham. In his sparkling red-and-white kurta, dramatics and all, Ghansham brought a breath of fresh air to the judging line-up of Alana Seebarran, Russell Lancaster, and Christian Sobers.

THE ELIMINATIONS
In its usual fashion, the episode began and ended with the eliminations, starting off with contortionist/break dancer, Robert Wall and singer Jamal La Rose being given the boot, after a three-way face-off in which Euphoria prevailed as the winner.
At the other end of the spectrum, it was ‘bye-bye’ for speed painter, Winston Alexander, who did a baffling portrait that was supposed to be Alana in the rain, but left poor Joel in shock after he mistook it for Winston’s wife.

Alana’s commentary on the portrait was occasionally interrupted with sounds of disagreement from Joel, who had little else to say of the whole situation.
It came as no surprise that Winston is not among the finalists; he really did not impress. On a positive note, however, if he doesn’t make it with this speed painting thing, he could perhaps try his hand at make-up, as whoever the woman in the painting was, her contouring was on point.

DELISHA ROCKS!
The climax of the night once again rested with a performance from 21-year-old Delisha, who rocked the stage in another original SAS Design, a red, long-sleeved, full-length number with side split in check.

Delisha hit some serious high notes, and really ‘threw down’ in a passionate, soul stirring performance of Andra Day’s “Rise Up”, set in a scenic animated backdrop of rolling savannah lands with towering mountains in the distance.

The performance exuded an air of revival session by the time she got down to the end, challenging Alana and Russell and the audience to rise above their struggles.

Delisha, as well as her mom, who was a part of the audience, were both in tears by the end of the song, and it took a hug from Faizal to help Delisha compose herself; but the heart-rending lyrics and melody of “Rise Up” makes it that kind of a song.

If Delisha keeps this up, she’s going to be spending these ‘Grangers’ not too long from now. She was the night’s best performance by quite a gap, especially taking into consideration the point that the competition is at.

ONE-ON-ONES
With only four acts for the night, run-time got padded with some one-on-one interviews with the judges and host; co-host Sean Thompson must have missed the interviews.

In Thompson’s one-off interview of the night, he pulled Trevaun over for a talk about his performance.
Trevaun had earlier covered the song, “Hallelujah” as calming palm trees swayed in the background for another emotional performance of the night. Selman’s raspy voice was not that far off from Leonard Cohen’s, and it wasn’t an altogether bad job, but knowing his potential, we know he can do better.

Last, and unfortunately least of the three, was Euphoria, who was not at their best, but having performed earlier in the face-off, it could have been that they were tired. Had Winston not been so bad, they might have been headed out the door instead. But that’s the case when producers want to squeeze two eliminations into one night.

Episodes continue next Wednesday night at 8pm on E-Networks’ Channel E1, or you can catch it on the show’s official Facebook page.