why a work talent show is so intimidating

I've written a couple posts now about the talent show at work. And I last year I wrote about that one. Both times I had fun. I enjoyed singing my songs even though I made some mistakes in the lyrics and chord changes. But none of the performances* were of professional quality. And why should they be? We're not professional entertainers**. We're actuaries and auditors and lawyers and accountants and I don't know what else.

And yet I still get nervous. Because when I think of talent shows, I think of the stuff from TV sitcoms. It seems that almost every sitcom from the 1970s found some excuse to have a talent show episode. Where all the stars somehow found their way to performing in the same show. I'll bet it was fun for the stars, since they got to show off talents that normally didn't make it into their roles. And it shouldn't be forgotten that they had the advantages of budget and full wardrobe and makeup departments.

So I think forward to the show, anticipating what I will do, and comparing it to what the TV stars did. Following are a few memorable examples of what my brain thinks of as talent show performances. You can see why I get intimidated.

From "One Day at a Time"

From "Laverne and Shirley"

From "The Brady Bunch"

From "Maude"

*There were singing performances, poetry readings and recitals, monologues about language, comedy routines. I'm sure there was other stuff, but I don;t recall what.

**With the exception of Brandon  Bujnowski, who performed last year. He's a guitarist with the neo-punk band, Bedpan Fight. Of course, he wasn't on the original schedule. But that's another matter.