His journey from tryer to survivor to established success story is unlike anything else seen in TV talent show history
In the embryonic days of UK TV talent shows, Darius Campbell Danesh – whose death at the age of 41 was announced on Tuesday – did two genuinely revolutionary things. Firstly, he succeeded in making a song his own – the holy grail of TV talent shows – via his gloriously OTT dramatic reading of Britney Spears’ …Baby One More Time on Popstars in 2001. Dressed somewhere between a roll-necked Steve Jobs and a swashbuckling musketeer, he became the instant star of a show that spectacularly failed in its remit to create stars.
For his second trick, he re-emerged later that same year looking like a matinee idol and singing like Elvis to finish third on Pop Idol and later land himself a UK number 1 single with Colourblind. Reality TV is all about narratives and often they can build up around people and solidify like cement; somehow, via an alluring mix of naivety, panache and genuine talent, Darius was able to re-write his.
