Sideswipe: May 4: Hmm, which to scan first?
3 May, 2021 05:00 PM
3 minutes to read
Prisoner on a Chinese reality show
In a story reminiscent of David Seymour on Dancing with the Stars, a Russian man who joined a boy band competition show on Chinese TV on a whim but
quickly regretted his decision has finally been released from his three-month ordeal after making it all the way to the final. Vladislav Ivanov, a 27-year-old from Vladivostok, was working as a translator when producers reportedly noticed his good looks and asked him to sign up as a contestant. Ivanov agreed but quickly came to regret the decision. Unable to leave on his own without breaching his contract and paying a fine, he instead begged viewers to send him home and deliberately performed poorly in the hope of being voted off. His first song was a half-hearted Russian rap, in stark contrast to the high-pop of his competitors. "Please don't make me go to the finals, I'm tired," he said in a later episode. "I hope the judges won't support me. While the others want to get an A, I want to get an F as it stands for freedom," the South China Morning Post reported him as saying. His pleas went unanswered and his fan base celebrated him as an icon of "Sang culture", a Chinese millennial concept of having a defeatist attitude toward life. Why did he do it? He thought joining the show might help his introverted personality.