CONSTANTINE MAROULIS: WILL HE OR WON'T HE?

About a thousand of you have been asking me about the concert tour that Will Makar mentioned in his interview with me this past weekend. Will said that he would be doing a mini-tour with Ruben, Constantine, Kevin Covais, and several other Idols. This caused great consternation among those whose lives consist largely of gossiping about the Greek One.

Then there was the post that Will left on Myspace that failed to mention Constantine's name. And the wheels turned further.

The die-hard Cons fans have been all aflutter about it, trying to decipher what it means, if it indicates that Constantine still recognizes his Idol past and will associate with it, or if he's doing it just to be doing it, or whatever... Some boards have been fretting over whether Constantine would "sell out" his integrity by performing with Idols. (Um, hello, performing with Idols is how come we all know who he is, right?) And there were those who just used the opportunity to poke fun at him.

Constantine's fandom is one of the most complex of all the American Idol contestants. My friends over at Carriefans and Kelliefans are pretty much straight-forward: they love their singer, and they're ardent about it. With the Constantine crowd, it's a whole 'nother level. You have groups who do nothing but sit around all day and theorize about what he'll do next. It goes on for pages and pages. And then you have groups that clearly hate him and spend a vast majority of time writing negative things about him and creating things that are a bit on the hateful side (even though they're often funny.) And the thing is, these fan groups HATE each other.

One board is so mystical, that even I as an objective reporter have to meet approval before even viewing it. I tried following their link to Will's interview back to the board, but it was safely guarded. I even received an email from a user of this board, who wishes to remain anonymous. He writes, "A couple of us have been doing a little research on you as well! We just feel in our capacity as a Constantine fan club, that it is partially our responsibility to help you understand that all boards out there are not Constantine friendly even though they may appear that way initially. You have registered on a board that we would advise you to steer clear of... As you can tell by negative comments on your blog, you would be wise to avoid such boards unless you truly want to become a tabloid blog." (The writer wanted me to keep the email between us, and I have for the most part, but that part was so melodramatic that I had to share it with the rest of the world.)

So, like I said, it's a complex and odd fan base.

Whichever side you fall on (and I am not taking any sides) I've got some answers for you regarding the question you've all been asking: Will Constantine be joining the mini-tour with Will Makar?

I asked Will to clarify, since I was fielding all these questions with no clue how to answer them. Here's what he said to me by way of email:

The promoter who hired me had him on the list. Kevin Covais' dad told my mom that Constantine's people had not approved that yet. So I don't really know. And I don't know how Kevin's dad knows that either. So I just stopped putting down that he was coming on the tour. It has not been decided yet, I guess.

So, there you have it, Constantine theorists. Discuss among yourselves.

And for those of you who'd like to see the other Idols (Kevin Covais, Ruben Studdard, Melissa McGhee, Anthony Fedorov, and others) and you're in the McAllen, San Angelo, Laredo, Corpus Christi and Beaumont, TX areas during the week of October 3-7, please go out and support these fine people, Constantine or no, and show them all your love.