IIRC, Elliott Yamin was one of those people whose audition was never shown. He was just shown briefly coming out the door with his Golden Ticket. And he made it to #3 his season, so there must be exceptions. I think he WAS shown a little bit during Hollywood Week, but that could be because he was stuck doing his group number with one of those notorious Brittenum Twins, thus, lots of "drama."
>>IIRC, Elliott Yamin was one of those people whose audition was never shown. He was just shown briefly coming out the door with his Golden Ticket.<<
True — there are exceptions. But I wouldn’t lay hard cash on it. All the back-channel gossip I have read suggests that the producers “target” a handful of contestants and basically rig the system to propel them into the finals (I don’t know about the final final).
But that is just 2nd and 3rd hand gossip (now 4th hand with this post LOL) — the reality may be not such a cynical setup...