‘The Masked Singer’: S’More Talks Reunion With Lance Bass, Boy Band Clues & More
Spoiler Alert
Take It Off! Take It Off!
For exclusive news and updates, subscribe to our The Masked Singer Newsletter:
[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for The Masked Singer Season 10 Episode 8 “Disco Night.”]
S’More thought he might be eliminated on “2000s Night,” which would have been fitting, but he did manage to make it a bit further in The Masked Singer Season 10. However, it was during “Disco Night” that he was sent home.
Not only were the panelists right when they picked up on the boy band clues, but one of them — Jenny McCarthy Wahlberg — even figured out exactly who was under the mask, first guessing him on 2000s Night and then sticking with it: Ashley Parker Angel from O-Town!
Below, the former boy-bander opens up about his time on the show.
You were very entertaining.
Ashly Parker Angel: Thank you. It was so much fun.
It looked like you were having a lot of fun on the stage, both during and outside of the performances — you brought the panelists’ names into a song, and then you had fun with Lance Bass when he gave the clue during 2000s Night.
So fun. And with Lance being on stage, we were actually both in Hairspray the musical together, so the first time we were actually on stage together in a while, but I couldn’t let him know it was me, so it was such a crazy situation.
Have you heard from him? I’m guessing it was you?
What’s so funny is, actually a lot of people have been guessing that it’s me, and I just don’t say anything at all. I went CIA-level secrecy on this one.
What made you say yes to doing The Masked Singer?
I was a fan of the show. A lot of my family is obsessed with the show, and I had been saying no to a lot of offers, and my agent was about to drop me. I say that kiddingly, but I did say pass on a lot of things since the last thing I did in entertainment was playing the lead in Wicked the musical. I got a chance to play my dream role of Fiyero, but then for the last five years and as the pandemic hit, I really switched gears, and I started my own online fitness coaching company, and I started working with people. It started as an experiment during the pandemic, and then it ended up being something I fell in love with. Helping people change their lives for the better, making a real deep impact one-on-one as a coach was really totally different than just being on stage performing. So I’ve been very selective, I’ll say, about the things that I’ve chosen to do and not to do. And Masked Singer, when it came along, was like, “Hell yes, count me in. I gotta do this. This is the right time. I haven’t been on stage in a while.” It was just literally the perfect opportunity.
Trea Patton / FOX
Talk about that costume. What appealed to you about the S’More?
I feel the S’More chose me. He spoke to me the minute I saw the S’More. I grew up in northern California, Redwood Mountains, spent all my time outdoors camping, building forts, making campfires, and making s’mores. So the S’More was the perfect character. And then that moment that I walked in the room and I first saw it brought to life, the team did such a spectacular job, with the boots made out of kindling and the fire coming up the legs and the marshmallow quads and the graham cracker body — it was such an amazing costume, but it really was a perfect thing because I love chocolate, I love s’mores, and who doesn’t, by the way?
You talked about the costume being hot and heavy in one of the clues packages. Was the head the part you had to take into consideration the most when it came to the performances?
Yes, because inside of that S’More, I am in a bicycle helmet, and it’s tightened around my head, and it’s so big that you can’t quite move your head the way you’d like to, so you have to take that into consideration. They do give you a lot of practice, they give you a lot of rehearsal time, but overcoming the physicality of being in this huge suit is part of the learning curve of being a performer on The Masked Singer that is unlike anything that pretty much any performer’s ever had to do. Most of the time, you’re just yourself. You’re not going to be this big character. But I think that’s the fun of the show. I think that’s what makes the show so wild and so unique and unlike any other show out there.
What went into your song choices?
So fun. It was a great collaboration, and they really work with you and let you pick songs that you love. My very first performance of “Slow Hands,” I thought that would be a great nod to my boyband past and being in O-Town, Niall [Horan] in One Direction, everybody always would say out of all the boy band members, he looked kind of like my younger brother, like we could have been from the same family. So I thought that’ll be kind of a cool nod to my boy band history. And then all of the rest of the songs — I’m a big Maroon 5 fan. “Hey There Delilah” is like, if we’re at a campfire site, I break out my acoustic guitar, that’s one of my go-to’s; it’s perfect. And then, of all the disco songs in the world, KC and the Sunshine Band, “That’s the Way (I Like It)” is my top pick. So it was a blessing to be able to do all these songs that I loved, that I’ve been singing since forever.
Did you have any songs in mind if you’d continued on?
I did, actually. I wanted to do some Green Day. I wanted to switch it. In the Smackdown with The Pickle, I got to do a Fall Out Boy song, and I told them I’d like to do some alternative rock, I’d like do kind of a little bit more of a rock song. Of course, you do get competitive. You want to make it to that next round. And by the way, they really help you pick what those next songs might be. So, Green Day was in the running as one of my next songs. I was going to possibly do “Boulevard of Broken Dreams” or “When September Ends.” S’More would’ve had a fun time with those songs.
You would’ve just gone through every genre while you were on then.
Season 10 is some really fun genres. And I’ve been watching as an audience member — Harry Potter Night, Elton John Night — but I really loved that I got to do 2000s night. That’s my era. That’s my decade. And then Jenny actually guessed me on that night. So I thought, is this the night that I’m going to go out and I’m going to sing “All or Nothing” on 2000s Night? It might’ve been a perfect night to go out, but then, in the Smackdown, I made it through another round.
Speaking of Jenny guessing, the panelists did get to boy band pretty quickly.
Yes, they did. And that clue package that night, S’More was lifting some dumbbells and it was really specific. I think I’m the only [boy-bander] ever to have launched my own online fitness coaching company. So Jenny’s like, I think he’s even a coach, and he posts some pictures on Instagram. I do post a lot of progress pictures and fitness-related content. So that clue, I think, was the dead giveaway, and I think that’s actually why she was able to guess me that night.
Yeah, Robin [Thicke] was just stuck on the 10 and thought it was the number of albums.
Exactly. And he thought the video game console was “Quit Playing Games (With My Heart)” and didn’t get that that I got my start as a video game voice actor. I don’t know how they come up with these clue packages. They do such a good job with it because they’re spot on, but they also leave some wiggle room.
Had you come into this expecting anyone from the panel specifically to figure you out?
I thought if somebody would figure me out, it would be Jenny because I feel like Jenny; she even said she knows her MTV, of course with [husband] Donnie [Wahlberg], there’s a boy band connection there. So I had a feeling it might be Jenny, and it was.
The stuff with Robin and being to his house, and he was probably going through every single person who had been to his house with that clue.
[Laughs] I know, and to be fair, it’s been a lot of people that have been through his house. But it’s kind of awesome when we talked about the clue packages, it had a lot of moments back in the day as O-Town when Nicole [Scherzinger] was in Eden’s Crush before she was even in Pussycat Dolls. So there was also a strong connection to Nicole there, too, which is why I kept asking the producers if I could serenade her. So there was a lot of fun there to be had with the panelists.
What will you take away from the experience? Will we get more singing from you now that you’ve been back on stage?
I feel like it’s always going to be a part of who I am, and it’s always going to be a part of what I love. My primary focus really has been building my health and wellness company and I’m loving it, and I do believe life is an evolution. So, what started out as an experiment turned out to be my full-time passion at this point in my life. But life is long. Right now, I’m working with hundreds of clients from all over the world, so I really can’t step away unless I were to quit doing that being able to help people level up in their lives and change their lives for the better has been deeply impactful for me as a human being. I love being on stage, and it’s so awesome to sing to people, and you see people’s reactions in the audience, but there just is something even deeper to helping someone change their life for the better. Focusing on health and wellness is such a feel-good business. It’s really been my primary focus now as a coach and coaching people from all over the world.
You’ve obviously done a reality show involving music before, albeit one that was very different from The Masked Singer. Is there anything from your experience on Making the Band that helped here or any similarities?
I think even more than my experience on reality TV; I would say my experience on Broadway was really helpful for me because on Broadway, things go wrong. There’s a live element where it’s an adrenaline rush when you’re in front of a live audience. And I think having years of Broadway shows under my belt really helped me when it was showtime because no matter how seasoned you are as a performer, you’re going to get nervous, and overcoming that can take years of practice. So I think it was a combination of sort of all those experiences. Reality TV, I’d done the Celebrity Cooking Showdown before. I did a surfing challenge with Kelly Slater on MTV, so I just think I was used to having cameras in my face — never as a giant graham cracker, though. So I was grateful, though, once I got there, for my experience in Broadway because, again, I’ve done four years of Broadway performances, eight shows a week, so I got my stage legs, so to speak, and it came back quickly, muscle memory, and I think it was very helpful.
The Masked Singer, Wednesdays, 8/7c, Fox
