Were you one of the fortunate few who managed to dodge the Miley Cyrus ticket scalpers in 2007?
Maybe you ended up paying a small fortune to keep your screaming pre-teen happy.
The 15,675 who packed the Miley Cyrus/Hannah Montana Best of Both Worlds concert on Dec. 1, 2007, at North Little Rock's Alltel (now Verizon) Arena saw a cute kid who looked like the girl in the left photo.
That's a shot of Miley in 2007. In the Disney Channel series, Miley Stewart donned a blond wig and -- presto -- nobody on the show realized Hannah Montana was really her. Sort of like when Superman puts on glasses, nobody recognizes him as Clark Kent.
That dual personality worked for a TV series premise. The wig allowed Miley to have a real life at home and be a superstar pop singer on her own terms.
Well, I wonder how that's working out for the real Miley these days? Is she still putting on a persona? (See the photo on the right.)
The 21-one-year old is all tatted up now (24 by latest count), working even harder to separate herself from her Hannah Montana image, smoking pot on stage (in Europe) and more often than not raising eyebrows everywhere.
She swung nude (but strategically covered) in her infamous "Wrecking Ball" video, and gyrated and twerked her way provocatively across the VMA Awards stage with a foam finger and Robin Thicke.
(For the record, you can buy your very own Twerking Twerk foam finger for $9.95 on eBay.)
Is this the natural post-Disney rebellion phase? Is the new raunchy Miley just another persona she's putting on like her blond wig? One must do what's necessary to carry on.
In that 2007 concert at Alltel, where some forgotten band called the Jonas Brothers opened the evening, our reviewer, Jennifer Christman, found the Miley and Hannah segments pretty much the same.
"They're both all about wholesome, yet short-skirt-wearing girl power," Christman wrote. "And glitter."
These days, "wholesome" is the last adjective that comes to mind with Cyrus.
Miley came back to town a couple of years later when she was 16 and Christman was disapproving of the skanky transformation already taking place.
"I'm bothered by what you were wearing," Christman wrote. "Rather, what you were not wearing. And how you were working it."
Christman noted Miley's "pelvic thrusting, hip shaking and chest popping" and "collection of booty-hugging hot pants ... that could make Daisy Duke blush."
That was then and this is now. Check her out.
NBC will air the two-hour Miley Cyrus: Bangerz Tour at 8 p.m today and promises "an unprecedented behind-the-scenes concert special."
The program focuses on Cyrus' stops in Barcelona, Spain, and Lisbon, Portugal.
Bangerz is Cyrus' most recent album and was released in October. As with her previous albums, it quickly went platinum. Her "Wrecking Ball" single -- the one with the nude video -- reached No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.
Is Cyrus doing all this for money? Is the raunchy image just for show? Something must be working. Cyrus has sold more than 12 million albums and 20 million tracks in the U.S. alone.
Note: The special is rated TV-14. Figures.
• View exits. Things are changing on The View. The ABC morning chat show is losing panelists Sherri Shepherd and Jenny McCarthy.
Barbara Walters retired from on-camera duties in May, so that leaves Whoopi Goldberg as the lone survivor. Rumor has it ABC officials are trying to lure Rosie O'Donnell back as co-host.
Shepherd has been with the show for seven years and she and the network couldn't agree on a contract. McCarthy only had a one-year contract and wasn't invited back.
• Coming this fall. I've had a couple of emails asking about a new USA original series titled Dig.
The "event" series (that means only a limited number of episodes are planned, then it's gone) comes from the guys behind Heroes and Homeland. It stars Jason Isaacs (Awake) as an FBI agent stationed in Jerusalem.
While investigating a mystery surrounding a young archaeologist named Emma (Alison Sudol), Isaacs "uncovers a conspiracy 2000 years in the making."
Also on board are Anne Heche, Regina Taylor, David Costabile, Omar Metwally and Lauren Ambrose.
• Black Jesus. Adult Swim has announced a new half-hour live-action comedy titled Black Jesus to debut sometime this year.
The series, from writer/producer Aaron McGruder (The Boondocks, Red Tails), stars Gerald "Slink" Johnson (Grand Theft Auto V) as Jesus living in present-day Compton, Calif., "on a daily mission to spread love and kindness throughout the neighborhood with the help of his small but loyal group of downtrodden followers."
Adult Swim is Turner Broadcasting System's network offering original and acquired animated and live-action series for young adults. It airs nightly from 8 p.m. to 5 a.m. and shares space with Cartoon Network.
The TV Column appears Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday. Email:
mstorey@arkansasonline.com
Style on 07/06/2014