Soul and star searching for teens

“Instant Star,” which premieres tonight on The-N -- the teen-oriented nighttime incarnation of Noggin -- is what might be called a young-adult telenovella. The 13-episode series concerns 15-year-old Jude Harrison (played by 18-year-old Alexz Johnson), who wins an “American Idol”-style competition that earns her a recording contract and less of the envy of her peers than one might imagine. Though produced in conjunction with The-N (which is owned by Viacom and related to MTV), the show is actually a product of Canada, where it has aired since January, in the time slot immediately following “Canadian Idol” (a title that surely sounds less amusing north of the 49th parallel).

Co-created by Linda Schuyler, previously part of the team behind the estimable Degrassi Cycle (“The Kids of Degrassi Street,” “Degrassi Junior High,” “Degrassi High” and now, also on The-N, “Degrassi: The Next Generation”), it treats its young subjects with similar respect, though it is much more of a fantasy than any of those other shows, and far less issue-oriented.

There is one issue here, really, and it is basically the same Dr. Faustus faced back in the day -- soul versus success -- with the nice twist that the tempters are mostly sympathetic characters who really do think they know best. In fact, in some ways they do, and it’s not always easy to tell to what degree the show endorses their plans to make Jude over into something salable. “Don’t let them change you, OK?” anxious pal Jamie (Kristopher Turner) says as Jude trundles off to meet her major-label fate, in the form of hot and hot-looking new producer Tommy Quincy (Tim Rozon). “Change can be good,” Tommy tells her, as he nudges her toward remaking her heartfelt folk ditty into a wave-your-hands-in-the-air pop anthem. (“You’ve got to pick up the tempo -- straight quarters on the bottom.”) Jude is conflicted, storming off in protest one minute and enthusiastically playing the game the next, which lets the producers have it both ways -- we get to take her both as a rebel and as pop star triumphant. She objects to showing her stomach in a photo shoot, but she shows it anyway.

We know she has integrity and deep roots by the punk accessories she affects -- her leather wristband, her Ramones T-shirt -- and by the way her eyes light up when Jamie presents her with “Joe Strummer’s guitar pick,” bought off EBay, and by the names she drops. “Kurt Cobain made ‘Nevermind’ when he was 23 -- I’m 15 -- that leaves me only eight years to create my masterpiece,” she tells Tommy. (She does not add, “And then die.”) Sonic Youth also gets a mention, though there’s nothing in Jude’s music -- which is exactly the sort of corporate-alternative-emo-pop the series requires to push the show toward the teenage mainstream -- that remotely suggests a liking for Sonic Youth or Nirvana. But it’s pleasing (to these old indie ears) to hear the names so solemnly invoked, as it is that of the New Pornographers (an especially hep, and especially Canadian reference).

With her impressively blocky profile, flaming hair and raccoon mascara, Johnson (a vet of Disney’s kid-”X-Files” series, “So Weird”) looks right, like a teenage cross of Shirley Manson and Chrissie Hynde, and because she’s actually singing -- and singing songs she co-wrote -- the musical sequences are as exciting as intended, even to those who know better. Johnson is a soulful enough presence to account for the occasional lapses in tone or sense, and for dialogue that sometimes has too much the ring of the adult screenwriter.

And though they are handy enough with terms like “mash up,” “free-styling” and “sick beats,” they don’t quite create a credible reality, either in the music-biz scenes, the high-school scenes or the at-home scenes -- but that may not be the point.

For, besides that of Faustus, the other classic tale “Instant Star” structurally resembles is “Buffy the Vampire Slayer”: Jude’s dynamic with her best friends Kat (Barbara Mamabolo) and Jamie -- who likes her, you know, like, he like-likes her -- is just that of Buffy with Willow and Xander, while her infatuated relationship with older, wiser, hunky, slightly dark producer-mentor Tommy recalls that of Buffy to Angel, mixed with a hint of Giles. (He shows her a few guitar moves, using the classic “golf lesson” get-cozy pose, though he is not actually trying to get fresh, being properly cognizant of her age.)

The dark fact of Tommy’s past is not that he used to drink human blood, but that he was Little Tommy Q in a boy-band called Boys Attack, although the two are regarded as morally equivalent. The main difference here is, of course, that the world of modern pop music is far scarier than living over the Hellmouth.

*

‘Instant Star’

Where: The-N

When: 6, 8 and 10 tonight

Ratings: TV-PG (may be unsuitable for young children)

Alexz Johnson...Jude Harrison

Kristopher Turner...Jamie Andrews

Tim Rozon...Tom Quincy

Executive producers: Linda Schuyler, Stephen Stohn and Michelle Lovretta. Creator, Linda Schuyler. Director, Pat Williams. Writers: Michelle Lovretta, James Hurst, Miklos Perlus, Emily Andras and Aaron Martin.