Precociousness (?) thy name is Julia.

Okay people:

(and Hello! Nice to meet you, by the way. I’m a little nervous, but Tom Cruise pumped to share the blogosphere with the lovely, funny ladies here on American Midol; but I’ll try to keep my couch bouncing and grave superiority in the fact that I know I’m the only one who can Really Help them in check as best I can)

this girl at last night’s Miami auditions epitomizes every reason for not exposing your kids to the biz until, well, they’re at least 18, preferably like 24 and technically no longer kids.



16-year-old Julia Dubela was a contestant on an Idol spin-off for the tween set I vaguely remember catching a few times called American Juniors. I’m gonna go out on a limb here in assuming a record deal wasn’t on the heels of her first TV debut at the age of 12, since four years later she crowded into a stadium with the sweaty hoi-polloi for a second shot at reality stardom, mugging for the cameras within an inch of her life.

Fair enough, but unfortunately, it seems Julia got a wee mixed up in her Fox shows, as she showed up to the Idol auditions wearing one of the dresses wardrobe gave her for American Juniors. This HAS to be the explanation for why her cooter was coming dangerously close to having its own solo (how her makeup kit got switched with Miss Piggy’s, I really can’t explain, but one thing at a time). I refuse to believe that any mother with eyesight would let that kind of hemline and peek-a-boo bra straps accompany her daughter down the block to the corner store, much less national television.

What made Julia’s audition really cringe-inducing though is the Lolita-esque angle the producers crammed down our throats that she was way too happy to validate. We see footage of her singing on American Juniors where she’s fresh-faced, modestly attired and rocking some cute little girl bangs, and you know, a 12-year-old. Cut to present day shots of her posing in a way that tells us she totally thinks she’s the hottest pop tart in Miami and somehow equates the passage of four years with 15 and it’s really uncomfortable—this girl fully expects America to be bowled over by her graduation from Limited Too to Forever 21, and she couldn’t be more mistaken.

Luckily Simon and Co. were similarly creeped out by the forced and Oh So Wrong professionalism she exuded that all child stars cultivate (“what’s precocious?”she asks the judges for the final nail in the coffin) and her inability to turn herself “off” even after she blew it. Her voice wasn’t half bad, but they told her she should have waited a few more years to audtion, and I totally agree, since I hope to God she’ll look back on her Idol footage ten years from now and want to crawl into a hole and die.

“Go to L.A and become an actress,” Simon suggested to her at the end. “You’ll do great.”

Um, okay, maybe on the CW, Simon, and that’s a honkin maybe. She should probably just crawl into that hole now, come to think of it.