Last night's big premiere of America's Got Talent provided the world with a predictably odd assortment of entertainers with various talents. From the Sad Clown singer to a Trump impersonator to an escapologist, AGT's newest season delivered a first hour of auditions that stunned and amused, and arguably no act checked both of those boxes more impressively than 12-year old Darci Lynne's incredible performance as a singing ventriloquist. Check it out below!
First and foremost: that was quite possibly the most adorable and awe-inspiring thing you're going to see today, even if you're yet to pass your eyes across your own children doing whatever less impressive thing they do. (Mostly kidding, everyone!) By all means, though, Darci Lynne can put on one hell of a show, as the young ventriloquist took the stage with her equally adorable rabbit puppet Petunia and somehow turned her innocent nervousness into a confident and superb rendition of Ella Fitzgerald's classic "Summertime."
Solely from an audio standpoint, Darci Lynne absolutely crushed that performance, and while she possibly wouldn't have made it to the main batch of contestants on The Voice or something, I'm willing to put this down as one of the greatest musical moments ever where a ventriloquist dummy is involved. And now that Lynne will have more time to shine on America's Got Talent, I'm hoping with all my might that we'll see a duo between Petunia and Kermit the Frog for "Rainbow Connection,"
In any case, that was just the vocal efforts, which says nothing of how fun Darci Lynne made things on a visual level. It would have been enough for her to just sing slightly differently, since the whole "singing with one's mouth closed" part was already banging. And it's not exactly a fully-arced act or anything, but there was an undeniable charm to watching Petunia's attempts to outshine Darci during the song.
Thankfully, Mel B was so taken aback by it all that she slammed the Golden Buzzer, and Darci Lynne's face went from lightly shedding happy tears to full-on water works. She was so taken aback by it all, it seems strange that she was able to pull that song off so relatively flawlessly. Considering how often ventriloquists end up winning America's Got Talent, combined with last year's young female singer winning it all, perhaps Petunia will be showered with even more celebrations in a few months.
With Tyra Banks now comfortably taking the spot of former host Nick Cannon, America's Got Talent airs Tuesday nights on NBC at 8:00 p.m. ET. If you want to know what else is hitting the small screen soon, don't be a dummy with a hand up your rear, and head to our summer TV schedule.
