Ex-’Idol’ contestant steps into the ring

A shy 23-year-old will open tonight’s reimagined Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus singing the national anthem a cappella. Then she steps into the center of the ring and takes over.

She has no traditional circus training and never even saw the show as a child. Yet Jennifer Fuentes will likely be the most recognizable face at tonight’s opening circus performance at the TD Banknorth Garden.

America last saw Fuentes in 2003 on season two of Fox’s “American Idol,” where she sang Whitney Houston’s “I Want to Dance With Somebody.” Fuentes didn’t quite make the final 12, which included eventual winner Ruben Studdard.

But now the not-quite-idol is part of the main event at the Greatest Show on Earth. Fuentes is the narrator of the circus’s first-ever story line as well as co-ringmaster. And, of course, she gets to sing.

She tips her top hat to Fox TV for giving her the courage to step into the ring in the first place.

“ ‘American Idol’ couldn’t have possibly better prepared me for the circus and being broadcast live on a huge video screen to thousands,” Fuentes said yesterday. “I was so shy. Ruben Studdard was in my group and made me feel so comfortable. We became close friends.”

The Homestead, Fla., native has tried jumping on the trapeze bars, juggling and walking on stilts for fun. But what she really came to do is sing.

“Thankfully they haven’t stuck me in a cage with lions yet,” she said. “When I first joined I was having just as much fun as the 5-year-old kid next to me grabbing the confetti. I grew up on a farm. Here there’s no pigs or cows, but I get to be around horses and elephants.”

A year after leaving “Idol,” Fuentes tried out for Ringling Bros.

“I never had seen a Ringling Bros. performance until I joined the show,” she said, “and I never would have thought in a million years I’d be doing this for a living. My parents thought I was crazy to join the circus, but they supported me anyway.”

You could imagine their surprise when she told them she was marrying the elephant trainer. The two were hitched last December.

source:http://www.bostonherald.com/entertainment/arts_culture/view.bg?articleid=1036036