Glee Cast

by itemvn  |  May 29, 2009 [Edit]

Glee is a musical comedy television series that airs on Fox. It focuses on a high school show choir, also known as a glee club, set within the fictional McKinley High School in Lima, Ohio. A pilot episode of the show was broadcast after American Idol on May 19, 2009, and the rest of the season will not begin airing until September 16, 2009.

The series will have covers of many different songs sung on-screen by the characters. Among the songs featured in the pilot are "Respect" (sung by Amber Riley), "Mister Cellophane" from Chicago (sung by Chris Colfer), "I Kissed a Girl" (sung by Jenna Ushkowitz), "On My Own" from Les Miserables (sung by Lea Michele), "Sit Down, You're Rockin' the Boat" from Guys and Dolls (sung by the entire glee club), "Can't Fight This Feeling" (sung a cappella by Cory Monteith), "You're the One That I Want" (sung by the entire glee club), "Rehab" (sung by a rival glee club), and, most notably "Don't Stop Believing" (sung by the glee club). It was announced on May 4, 2009 that the night of each airing, the songs will be made available on iTunes starting on May 19, 2009, with full versions of "Rehab" and "Don't Stop Believing".The song "Don't Stop Believin'" performed by the Glee Cast debuted at #4 on the Billboard Hot 100 on May 28, 2009.

Before the show began airing, it already gained positive buzz. Entertainment Weekly gave the show an A. In addition, the show ranked among the top trending topics on Twitter shortly following its initial airing. The New York Times called the show "blissfully unoriginal in a witty, imaginative way", saying the characters are "high school archetypes" but noted "a strong satiric pulse that doesn’t diminish the characters’ identities or dim the showmanship of a talented cast".

Over the entire hour, the Glee Pilot actually drew an average of 10 million viewers. (Its 9 o'clock number was 12.518 million but that dropped noticeably going into the 9:30 slot as it dropped from first place to third, retaining only 8.917 million). It was also a steep drop off from American Idol which drew 23.8 million viewers at the 8 o'clock hour.

(Last edited by AndrewGustavo)