Your Tropes Here
Chances are if you were a kid or teenager in the early 2000s, and if you watched MTV, you dreamed of being on Becoming.A lucky fan of a band or singer would be chosen to be taken to Los Angeles for one weekend, get pampered and showered with expensive gifts, have their hair cut, taught how to dance or play an instrument (or at least fake it) and finally recreate one of their idol's music videos. The singers imitated included Britney Spears, Eminem, blink-182, P!nk, Kylie Minogue, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Usher, Jennifer Lopez and loads more. There was even a recreation of the famous "Lady Marmalade" video. The show ran for four seasons.
There was also a spin-off titled Wannabes where three sets of fans would take part in a live impersonation contest - and the winner would perform on stage.
This Show Provides Examples of:
- Adapted Out: When doing the Destiny's Child video for "Say My Name", only three girls were used. There was a fourth member in the group at that stage.
- Always Identical Twins: The first set of twins to be contestants were identical. Justified because they were both becoming Jennifer Lopez.
- Ambiguously Gay: Several people on the show, typically male stylists. Because it was a family show, they couldn't outright state it.
- Bottle Episode: Every so often, it became fairly obvious that the videos that were chosen were done so because they would be the cheapest to replicate. An especially noticeable one was the Nelly Furtado episode. They decided to remake "On the Radio" despite it being a minor hit compared to "I'm Like a Bird" or "Turn Out The Light."
- The Cameo:
- Kelly Osbourne appeared on the show, making her the only celebrity to have met her fan in person.
- Jenna Jameson also appeared on the show as one of the women in Eminem's "Without Me" video, as she did in the actual Eminem video.
- Costume Porn: Every episode would feature many displays of the various different outfits required for the video. They seldom picked music videos that had only one outfit.
- Dancing Is Serious Business: Justified, since they had to learn a routine in a matter of hours.
- Fake Nationality: Since the fans were only lipsyncing there were a couple of different nationalities - a German girl becoming the Australian Kylie Minogue, a British girl becoming the American Beyonce etc. Averted with Avril Lavigne (who is Canadian); the girl becoming her was the first Canadian to imitate someone on the show.
- Genki Girl: Kristen, the girl who became Britney Spears. She was bouncing down the stairs when she got the news.
- Hilarious Outtakes: Highlights included one 'member' of Sugar Ray ordering room service pretending to be the real thing, one 'member' of Sum 41 dropping a series of terrible pickup lines on an extra and the actor playing the boyfriend in the Mandy Moore video hitting on the dance instructor.
- Identical Twin ID Tag: The twins that played Jennifer Lopez looked pretty much the same but then one was given corn rows and the other hair extensions so telling them apart was easier.
- Important Haircut: Nearly every episode featured the fan getting his or her artist's hairstyle. This would often be the biggest step toward looking like the artist. At least one aversion occurred with the girl who "became" Eve. She cut her hair, but wasn't quite ready to go blonde. Averted with the Destiny's Child video for "Bootylicious", where all the girls just wore wigs.
- Makeover Montage: The haircut scenes usually took this form.
- Race Lift: The producers certainly weren't picky about what ethnicity the fans were, even if it didn't match that of the artist. As such, we got an Asian P!nk, white Michelle Williams (from Destiny's Child, to avoid any confusion), Hawaiian Ashley Poole and various others. This was noticeably more common in groups with a Lesser Star: They probably had their choice of look-a-likes in the pool of Superfans for Beyonce or Justin Timberlake, but when it came time to fill in the Michelle Williams/Joey Fatone section of the group, they probably just had to take what they could find.
- The Remake: All the music videos.
- Scenery Porn: The show featured several shots of the Beverly Hills scenery, as well as various scenic shots of the location from which they picked the fans up.
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Spiritual Successor: The British show "Reach For The Stars" was very similar though featured younger kids and more varied careers. - Strictly Formula: The fans get picked up and learn the routines, get the clothes, get the makeover and a whole lot of gifts on day 1 and shoot the video on day 2 (sometimes additional shooting on day 3).
- Technology Porn: Usually the gifts included plenty of state-of-the-art gadgets for the early 2000s time period.
- Totally Radical: The show is very MTV and is dripping with early 2000s pop culture.
- Wig, Dress, Accent: A lot of the time without the accent, sometimes with.
