Simon Cowell - ‘I often think: what gives me the right to judge people?’

0:00Hello there. Did you know that you can hear all of the things that my guests might have failed to divulge in the main episode by joining us in our subscriber community. Failing With Friends. It's where you will hear really riveting pieces of information like Olivia Atwood's dream date location or Miranda Hart's advice on performing bodily functions in front of your partner. Just follow the link in the podcast notes and we will see you there.

0:37welcome to how to fail now this podcast was born out of my own failures in life and I firmly believe that we measure success in the lessons we've learned along the way rather than the things that always go to plan so every week I ask a new guest about three times they failed and what, if anything, they've learned along the way. It was like publicly being humiliated. But I remember someone shouting, you wanker. And I went, actually, you're right, I am a wanker. Would you judge us having sex? I'm like, are you winding me up? They went, no, we'll pay you. How much? At Sierra, discover great deals on top brand workout gear, like high quality walking shoes, which might lead to another discovery.

1:2540 ,000 steps, baby. Who's on top now, Karen? You've taken the office step challenge a step too far. Don't worry, though. Sierra also has yoga gear. It might be a good place to find your zen. Discover top brands at unexpectedly low prices. Sierra, let's get moving. My guest today remembers proffering his first critical judgment at the age of four, when he told his mother that her white pillbox hat made her look like a poodle. Like a poodle. Since then, Simon Cowell has built a multi-million pound entertainment empire on his ability to say exactly what he thinks and an uncanny capacity to judge the public mood.

2:09It was Cowell who devised a plethora of wildly successful TV talent show formats that would transform the face of popular culture. From launching Pop Idol in 2001, The X Factor in 2004, and the cultural behemoth Britain's Got Talent in 2007, he's been at the helm of primetime around the world for over a quarter of a century. As a judge, Cowell became infamous for his bluntness. His trademark phrase, I don't mean to be rude, but later provided the title for his autobiography. His TV shows and psycho record label have shaped the careers of everyone from One Direction to Little Mix, Susan Boyle, and Leona Lewis.

2:51It's quite the journey for a boy who, growing up in Elstree, Hertfordshire, hated school so much he started smoking and drinking at the age of eight, before leaving full-time education as soon as he could, at 16. It was his mother, Julie, who filled out a form for him to work in the mail room at EMI Records. Cowell got the job and from there worked his way up. I'm always striving for something else, he said in his 2006 Desert Island Discs interview. I don't relax. I've tried to and I can't. I'm very, very competitive. I like winning. Simon Cowell, welcome to How to Fail. That was a good intro, by the way.

3:33Thank you. I could actually remember everything, as you said it, from the poodle to buying number six cigarettes at the age of eight. Going down, when my mum and dad had a party and my brother, Nicholas and me, we would go down in the morning and take all the butts out of the ashtrays. If it was like half a cigarette, it was like bingo. It's an hating school. Well, I know I ended, it's a bit of a con on my part with a 2006 quote about how competitive you are and how you like winning and how you find it hard to relax. You were 46 then when you charmed the pants off Sue Lawley. You're 65 now. Has that changed?

4:19you know on that day i had the worst migraine ever and it was something i really wanted to do desert island discs and i remember thinking god i've got the worst migraine i shouldn't be doing this so what should have been a great experience actually was terrible so i want to do it again and i would change the songs okay yeah because your luxury was a mirror yeah do you remember Yeah, I do. He said, I quote, I'd miss me. That might have changed now, yeah. But yeah, I mean, I'm still, I think I'm still pretty much the same. I'm still competitive now. But as, you know, we were saying earlier on, I kind of like learnt, I think, how to work better.

5:07Often when people are competitive, it's because they're trying to prove something to someone. Yeah. Does that resonate with you? It does, particularly, I think because, you know, my job, it's so public. And I often think, what gives me the right to judge people if I'm not signing artists, for instance, at the moment? So I did something recently where I thought, okay, I'm going to do something to create a band very publicly, which is going to come out in a few months time and to see whether I can do it again or not. Partly, I think to prove to myself, I just had this kind of like nagging thing in the back of my mind, you know, what was the happiest time of my life?

5:51And it's always been working with bands. I've loved that energy when you find that first person, second person to their first record or their first tour. It's so hard to articulate that excitement. And I thought, well, maybe there isn't kind of a band like One Direction or Little Mix for so many years. Why not do it again? And honestly, it was one of the scariest things I've ever done. But I had to do it. Have you found the band? I think I have. I don't want to give it away. Okay. I actually said to her, I'm not going to talk about it. And this is the first thing I'm talking about. Was there a fear at one point that you had lost your edge?

6:37Because if I look at Simon Cowell now that I see on my TV screen, as opposed to Simon Cowell then on my TV screen, it does seem as though you've softened and mellowed and you've become a father. and we went through the pandemic and you had a sort of life-altering accident in 2020. All of those things, do you think they have softened you and did that worry you? Oh God, yeah. There was a moment, I mean, going back to that accident because, you know, it was bad. I mean, I had this, it wasn't really a bike, a bicycle. It was basically an electric motorbike, so powerful. You just couldn't keep the front wheel down.

7:16So I shipped it in from England, couldn't wait to ride it and i was in the driveway and my son was there and i pulled the throttle and this it did the biggest wheelie and it threw me like seven eight feet in the air and i landed like that on my back and the second i landed i went shit i know i've broken my back because i could feel it and the first thing i did was can i move my hands yes can i move my feet yeah okay that's not too bad and then you know I was in the ambulance and blah blah blah blah blah and then I woke up from surgery and I thought actually it's not too bad and the guy goes you've got pain blockers in you in three or four days time it's going to wear off and in three or four days time yeah it wore off and I and at that moment I thought wow this is this is really really bad and I could have died and it was a kind of a wake-up moment which is I am crazy but you know it I it kind of happened for a reason because I thought I was fit and then when I had to do all the kind of like the physio afterwards just walking because they make you walk very quickly but for three months I pretty much couldn't move and then I started to walk a lot and then I realized my god i really really am in a bad place or wasn't a bad place i was just getting up walking to my telephone i would stay on the phone for 10 hours and that was basically my life seven days a week so as bad as it was i do believe it happened for a reason because i'm now fitter I'm still a bit crazy on my bikes but it it really does make you realize life is really precious and it just like that could have gone did you have a near-death experience where you came face to face with what might be on the other side was it that kind of experience well you know in America uh obviously where it happened you know it took quite a long time from getting the ambulance getting to the hospital luckily i had a great surgeon and i had so much pain medication at that point i was kind of out of it and then he said you know we had to do the x-rays and he showed me the x-ray and i'm like god he said look i'm not going to lie simon number one i don't know if i can fix this and which means you you probably won't walk and secondly the operation's going to take maybe 11 hours so stating the obvious it could go wrong and at that moment I'm like oh gosh and all I kept thinking about was you know my family and everything and in that moment you kind of realize you know the most important thing is your health and don't do stupid stupid things and then thankfully you know it all worked out fine my back's fine now I'm fitter than I was five years ago all i was worried about was how do i explain it to my son who was really tiny at the time he didn't really understand um because you know inside me i've got this metal rod and i've got these screws and i and i'm just lying there and and i said eric have you watched that movie iron man he went yeah i said well that's sort of what i am now i'm made of iron and he kind of got it from that point.

10:53And once I knew he understood, I was fine with it at that point. How old was Eric then? He would have been, let me think, so 2005, so he would have been six. Okay. Yeah, five, six, yeah. You are renowned for your put-downs and the occasional savagery of your responses, particularly in the early seasons of Pop Idol and X Factor. Do you regret any of them? not really i was approached a lot when i was an a &r person you know i was just running a record label and it was at the time where you know people who weren't well known they were um they were doing like fly on the wall documentaries and i kept getting all these offers to be on tv and i'm like this is the last thing i want to do however uh i turned down being a judge on pop stars I knew I'd made a mistake because by turning down being on the show I didn't get to sign the winning act yes yeah and they were terrible but I knew they were going to sell a lot of records and I just thought we just got to get on this so we kind of just I just decided if we're going to do it the only person I can really trust is myself and if I'm going to do this I'm not gonna lie uh because i know you know how difficult it is to break an artist and because of my own personal experiences when i was you know starting off and it was tough really really difficult when i first started um what made me better were the people who were honest with me and they were i wouldn't say brutal i mean it was kind of like uh would you work with this artist no do you think this records are here no would you produce this artist never and you have to kind of just work it out they weren't being rude to be rude they were just being you know honest and i had to kind of understand in a relatively short period of time i've got to get the right artist with the right song with the right idea and learn from it so therefore when i was in a position to kind of do the same thing i thought well if i tell someone who can't sing they can sing i'm just lying and i just couldn't do it i do think looking back they did find a lot of bad singers because they was terrible some of them and i and i genuinely all i was thinking about was if we don't find someone who can sell records in the first year i'm toast this is going to be really embarrassing and even you know my bosses at the time they were saying what are you thinking Simon I'm like well I think if this works I think we can sell a lot of records think about it like you're doing really well Simon you know you're signing a lot of artists anyway you can this this is uh you know very public don't do it and I'm like well I'm going to give it one good one go so all I kept thinking of that first year was where's the start and then there was that one audition gareth gates he just came in because i actually have a bit of a stutter as well people don't know that no yeah there are times where i just can't get the words out for whatever reason sometimes when i'm stressed um and i kind of related to that this guy and he was trying to talk and he just looked so good and I thought, wow, he looks like a star, this boy.

14:22And he couldn't talk. And it took about 10 minutes for him to eventually sing. And then when he sang, he was like a completely different person. And then there was a press launch for the show. And I saw that clip. And in that moment, I went, this is going to work. Before we get onto your failures, do you have a favorite put down from the early era of Simon Cowell? I can't remember. I mean genuinely I can't even watch this stuff back now I mean I don't watch the only time I watch my shows is before they go out so I get like a rough cut on the show so I kind of look at it as is this working is it the right acts whatever whatever whatever once it's gone out I never look at it again like I don't have any gold discs in in my in my houses or what a house sorry what do people ask you to say to them when they meet you in the street or do they just ask for selfies people used to ask me to be rude to them i mean literally they would come up and say you know particularly in america will you be rude to me and i'm like no and then one time it's a true story um i was in a restaurant and this guy comes up to me and he said um uh you know i love your show thank you very much uh will you will you take a picture sure this is my wife nice to meet you um would you judge us having sex i'm like are you winding me up they went no we'll pay you how much and it actually was a lot of money i thought do i no i just can't do it it was 150 grand it was 150 grand yeah we found your moral scruple that's what you said though to you said yeah yeah this is kind of a sexual kink well it was just so So bizarre.

16:11That's something I really have enjoyed though, weirdly, is that I am very shy. Like I can't go to a pre-party. It's my worst thing in the world, making small talk with people I don't know. If we have a common subject, I'm pretty good. But years ago, if I had to go to a party, particularly if you have to stand up with a drink, with horrible food, and just talk to people you don't know it's torture so once I was known by people it was kind of good because it broke the ice with people you meet so instantly they know you you you're talking about something I like you know which is the shows or the artists or whatever so it kind of helped me with my shyness that's fascinating yeah but still now lauren is brilliant in these positions this is your yeah i'm hopeless so joan collins had a birthday party and i'm like get out of it and i said to lauren okay i'll go but we have to time it so because there'll be a horrible like i said stand-up pre-drinks i can't do that so at the same time you know joan is a diva and if you're late, you'll kill me.

17:32So I'm trying to balance everything. So I just, okay, fine. I think we've timed it well. We didn't. For 45 minutes, I had to talk to people and I was dying inside. I was so, I was so stressed by the time I got to the table. I left after about 30 minutes because I just can't deal with it. Draining. Draining. Yeah.

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18:59But before we do that, your first failure is bankruptcy. So this was when, in your late 20s, the company that owned your record label went bankrupt. Is that right? Yeah. So I had started a label with about£4 ,000 or£5 ,000. And someone had backed me financially. And then the guy who backed me was part, then his company was bought by another company or something. I can't remember. And that company went bust. Now, when it was public, I think we were buying shares or I borrowed money. I was in debt. So when the big company went bust, we all went bust. And then I was, I mean, literally bankrupt. I owed the bank about, I think,£250 ,000.

19:54My house, I think, when I sold it, I still owed about£70 ,000 on the mortgage. I had to just get rid of everything, house, cars, everything. And luckily, my parents were living in London. And I had to get from my old house to their apartment. And I had just about£5. pounds and I kind of worked out will the five pounds get me you know in a cab to my mum and dad's and that was it I mean that was the moment I thought Christ almighty I really am broke um but they were brilliant they were kind of like it happens you know you've learned a lesson I found then a man a bank manager who lent me some money to pay back the other bank over time time so I just in a weird way kind of got lucky with it when I've heard you speak about this before you've been asked whether you felt humiliated and you said no that actually in a way it was good for the balloon to be punctured yeah tell me a bit more about that well it was the it was the 80s so it was kind of everything was about Porsches flashy you know it was very obnoxious and I was very obnoxious I think um I'd had a big hit record Robson and Jerome no this was Sunita actually was my first artist and you know um the record sold about a million copies so you know I was making you know for someone in their early 20s a lot of money but it was it was really an illusion because it wasn't my company um I didn't really make much of the profits I had lots of credit cards and just I think I just believed because it was really my my first attempt at breaking an artist that was going to last forever and it didn't and then yeah when it when it happened I didn't miss the house that definitely didn't miss the Porsche I hated that Porsche looking back and and my mum and dad were amazing you know they didn't think that I'd failed because I'd succeeded but failed at the same time.

22:02Yes. I had success, but I just didn't have any money. No one kind of like stopped being my friend. I bought a TR6 for about six and a half grand, which I loved. Is that a car? Yeah, just loved it. I remember seeing it in a showroom, bought it. It always went wrong, but I just loved it because I could afford it. And I loved that car more than the Porsche because it was kind of everything became real at that point. And I really learned a lesson about don't borrow money. Just don't. Just live with what you have and just be happy with that. How obnoxious were you? Well, I do remember one time I was driving in my Porsche.

22:43I had long hair. The top was down. And I passed this pub. And I remember someone shouting, you wanker. And I went, actually, you're right. I am a wanker. And I put the top up. So I probably was, yeah. And your parents, Eric and Julie, were clearly a formative and profoundly important influence on you. Can you tell me a bit about them and who they were? Well, they were just amazing people. I mean, honestly, genuinely just kind people as well. I remember my dad, I suppose he would be middle class. You know, when he died, he didn't have any money. However, we did grow up in nice houses. We were always moving.

23:31I remember that. He was very generous. He worked for a company, EMI. So he retired at 65. And once he retired, he never had another phone call. And I remember seeing that. And that was really hard to see him because he was still really smart. but because he was part of a big company, it was over. And that was kind of depressing. My mum was like super glam. She reminded me of Elizabeth Taylor. Who you met when you were a child, didn't you? Yeah, yeah. Because our next door neighbours, I think, ran one of the big studios. So they were always having these flashy parties and we'd always be looking over the fence.

24:15I think that was probably looking back, looking at that party. it was weird because I didn't want to be the actor or the actress. I wanted to be the person who had the party, even at that really young age. So your mother was like Elizabeth Taylor. Sorry, I interrupted. Yeah, she was very glam. But again, she was very down to earth. I mean, the last thing they were were snobs. They just weren't. They were, again, very grounded. My mum didn't come for money. My dad didn't come for money. They didn't inherit anything. everything my dad built up he built up himself my mom was incredibly hard-working she was a dancer but she you know just ran the house I mean I was a total brat when I was a kid I mean really bad thank god Eric isn't like that and I was always in trouble I mean really really in a lot of trouble and they just taught me I don't know the right values I think about respect kindness and importantly I think particularly for my mom is you know have fun in life you know she always had fun a lot of fun you must miss them oh god yeah I mean when I lost it was hard when I lost my dad I mean it was really really hard because I sort of made myself believe that no one was ever going to die genuinely because I never had that moment because I didn't know my grandparents so when my I had that call that my dad had passed with I just it was never just I couldn't get my head around it and even then I had to take a month off work I just couldn't talk to anyone it was really hard I remember you know getting off this plane and seeing my mom and then realizing at that point I'm sort of now the parent I've got to look after my mom now and that's what I promised her you know

26:14saying to her look I'm always going to be here for you because my dad's not here anymore and then when she passed away that was for me it was like my world had ended at that point I was still doing TV shows I'd made some money and at that point it was like god none of it I mean, what's it for? Genuinely, I was broken, absolutely broken. And I still had to be on camera. And that was just torture. And it took me a long, long time. And fortunately, thank God, even though the circumstances weren't perfect, Eric was sort of starting to arrive. so my mom had met eric even though she had dementia at that point she you know she always wanted me to be a dad and she adored him just adored him lauren and eric you know at that point they kind of saved me really because i didn't realize that you could ever have that love for another human being you have your parents it just is that but it's even bigger I mean, it's just indescribable.

27:36From the moment I saw his scan, I was obsessed, you know? And I guess looking back, that's how they, that's how I got away with so much because they loved me in the same way as I love Eric. And I kind of get that now, which is, you know, it's everything. And it kind of, yeah, reset me. And I thought, okay, now I have a purpose. Now everything starts to make sense. And yes, it's great to have success in this and that. However, everything, I think, if I do believe in destiny and sliding doors and everything, everything was sort of meant to happen. Thank God, you know. So beautifully put. And maybe if you did desert island discs again, now you'd take a photo of Eric as your luxury.

28:25Yeah. Do you see your parents in Eric? Yeah, I do. A lot. I do. um he's um he has absolutely my mom and dad in him he has um my mom's sense of humor because he's very funny he really makes me laugh and he has this incredible kindness and that's what i was trying to teach eric from a very early age which is please thank you like my mom said manners make of the man i told him that the first time he looked at me like what and then he got it quite quickly understanding people work with us not for us all that kind of stuff you know everything they taught me i can now teach him which is fantastic yeah we started off talking about bankruptcy and it's quite some turnaround someone who had to pay back 250 grand and get a loan from the bank to pay off his bankruptcy your reputed worth is now around 500 million pounds oh god it's not that I'm not even close to that I'm being serious I'm not I've made a lot I'm not gonna lie I've made a bit of money yes but not that much no do you think you're rich well probably yes I've definitely got enough I don't need any more I don't yearn for what I thought I wanted a few years ago because you know when I was a kid I had no idea of anything like yachts and the caribbean or you know private planes i swear to god i had no idea so when the first time in my i think i guess the early 40s it must have been i sort of came across this world and saw it i'm like what that is a your own boat it was like a like a cruise ship so there was a point, I'm not going to lie, where I thought, maybe I haven't done as well as I thought.

30:21Maybe that's what I want. And I did start to kind of mix with some of those people for a couple of years. I'm going to be honest with you, I hated it. I didn't like the people. I thought they were obnoxious. I thought they were snobby. I think a lot of those people thought they were better than other people because they had money, which is ridiculous when you think about it. so it was kind of again a kind of a good thing that it happened because i remember saying to do you do we know actually know anyone who's rich i mean super rich and happy she went no i went nor me so we're fine we're doing all right but we don't need more do you remember a point when you felt i no longer need to worry about money i always worry about money uh because of I think you have to, in a way.

31:16You think about COVID as an example. No one could have predicted COVID. I remember reading it for the first time on a website. And I don't read a lot of stuff on social media, but I'd heard about it. So I was curious. And the second day, the story got bigger to a point where I actually phoned my partner and I said, I don't like the look of this. i have a horrible feeling it's going to be like that movie contagion and i think we need to get all of our shows into production around the world quicker this year and and we did and it when it happened uh it was i mean obviously worse than i could have imagined but i mean when you think about that the wars and everything else the instability what is safe i mean it was gold cash stock i don't need safe any longer i guess your house live in a nice house yeah someone did actually say to me once thank god live in your money and it was really good advice i enjoy it and be happy with it but understand that you know the world is precarious so the answer is no yeah you still worry about money i do yeah that's kind of an amazing thing to hear.

32:39Yeah, I do. Your second failure is the struggle and initial failure that you had getting Britain's Got Talent commissioned. Yeah. Which is a story I did not know about. So how did you come up with the idea? I was living in an apartment, watching a rival show, watching a singer literally murder this song. I think, wow, I can't watch any more of these shows. and I actually thought I actually rather watch a dog act I don't know why it came into my mind you do love a dog I love dogs I just thought dogs variety that would be fun why don't we just make like a a proper proper talent show I just had in that moment thank god because of that girl singing that song it just made me think oh you know what singing is still important but why not just open it up because youtube just started to kind of really happen and there were so many funny things on youtube i thought actually this could be brilliant so i had it in my head what it would look like uh but no one else did literally no one else got it um so i had to force itv now to be fair itv now are brilliant partners and they really i'm not just saying that but they really have been amazing then not so much because i i i said look please please i really want to make this show and eventually we made a pilot and it was dreadful to be fair uh it was so bad there was only about seven minutes of it which was actually watchable it was terrible but the seven minutes we shot was really funny and i got a call from nbc in america and they said what's the show by the way then itv because the pilot was so bad it was dead so there was no britain uh britain's got talent so the show is dead so then i get a call nbc what's the show like amazing can we come over i said yeah i'll show you a highlight reel i didn't tell them the truth um so i just showed them the seven minutes they went oh my god it's amazing can we buy it literally in my house no one ever says that yeah so we sold it so the show was a hit amazing i didn't think it was going to to do that well but he did and then i was able to persuade um itv uh to make britain's got talent so we got everything agreed and then three or four days before we were due to shoot i get a phone call uh a guy called simon and he said i need to see you and i thought that's bad news and he came over and he said we're we're putting the show i said why he said it's not going to be a hit i said how do you know he said i'm just telling you i'm i'm saving your career i'm saving enton deck's career we're not making the show i said well we are we because i've got 150 people in i think it was birmingham ready to shoot in three days time well we're putting the plug i said i'll tell you what give me a day and i was thinking christ let's pay for this ourselves i can't stop i can't tell anyone so we went up and everyone's kind of super excited i'm thinking this is going to last a day and i actually saw someone from the network in the back of the theater i thought they're not kidding around here luckily the first audition was so funny and the audience got it i texted the guy and i said i really think this is going to be a hit cut a long story short they said yes begrudgingly but they wanted the show off the air as quickly as possible which is why we had the live shows stripped over a week and it's changed now it's now weekly but it was it was just one of those things where i was just shocked because i even thought from the from the outset this is just obvious that you know in the climate that we were in music shows were just blowing up all over the world variety shows was something i used to watch as a kid and loved so logically it's going to work again and there's so many great people out there i mean youtube you know was just showing that so i was just surprised that no one got it however they didn't now they've been brilliant the new people at itv get it nbc have been amazing in fact it's our 20th anniversary this year Congratulations.

37:06It's amazing. But I think it's kind of, weirdly, again, you kind of have to go through that bit of a struggle. Because if everything was easy, it would be boring. I mean, genuinely. And so did you pay for that crew and production for those couple of days when ITV wasn't on board? No. If they had pulled the plug, I would have had to have said, okay, we're stopping production. I would have had to say to my partner, we don't have a network. Maybe we're going to sell it to somewhere else or whatever, whatever, whatever. I just didn't think in that moment. I just thought we have to keep going. It's that child troublemaker part of you.

37:49And there's also, I do find it extraordinary. One of the things that you often say and you're right in the audition process is that the public knows. Always. And I wonder how you know that, because you also have this instinct for what the public wants. Where does that come from? I have commercial tastes. Let's put it this way. I mean, I like everything that's popular from baked beans to cornflakes to ITV, the BBC. I mean, I've just liked popular things. I'm not sort of into niche things. I like popular records which is why I made pop music which is just an abbreviation of popular so I've never had to guess I've only done something based on what I like when I'm say on a live show and I'm in my dressing room and I've got a tv monitor and I can see the theater or the studio I still pinch myself because it's like I can get on the phone and say to the director can you make it green and it will go green in that second and it's like brilliant it's it's still for me that i i still really get a kick out of that talk to me about fame you mentioned earlier that being recognized makes it easier to navigate horrible small talk at parties but it's been such an interesting period of time for fame in in in the two decades since you've become really famous fame itself has gone through lots of transmutations and there is a dark side to it and I just wonder how you feel about fame and also the fame that you give others well and I had to explain this to Eric because you know as you know when we used to walk together and I was I used to laugh because people would recognize me and of course you know he's a kid and he didn't get what was going on and one day I had he said dad why does everyone laugh when they pass you well my job is I'm well known let's put it that way I'm on a tv show that means people know me so that's it so that's how I look at it as not I don't use the word fame it's more well known lots of people know who I am and that's kind of good actually was there ever a point where you were aware that the caricature of cowl was overwhelming the actual simon cowl i used to get frustrated where i had to keep reminding people of why we did this in the first place which is what is more important the show or the end result for me it's the end result you want someone at the end of your show to do well because otherwise it would be pointless i seriously pointless um so there were certain producers along the way who i think thought probably the show was more important than what i cared about and so there would be clashes um now i think we're in a really good place i think we found that place which is we have some crazy acts come on but they know they're crazy but in a good way um so we're all in on it together.

41:07At the same time, producers will book someone who they think is brilliant, and I don't. And so we just disagree. Okay. Talk to me about, say, a One Direction. Is it obvious from the moment one of those then boys walks in that they have it? no i think looking back i can remember every one of the boys first auditions and um i mean harry is an example he was just very charming and he just charmed everyone just by talking about pies or something and he had a good voice and he looked great and he was just really a nice person and that applies really to all of the boys you know i mean niall is an example i've person who was with me wanted to say no to him i said are you kidding i just say yes it's gonna change your life we had a big argument off camera about it however for whatever reason maybe it was just nerves and experience i at that point perhaps other people were doing better and then at that moment when they were on stage and i saw the boys we were like well hang on a moment we can't lose them what do we do and then it was like okay what if we put them in a group so it sort of happened in about 20 minutes honestly and then when i saw the five boys together yes i did think wow they look amazing i mean there's a kind of a great energy about them and of course i knew a lot about them because they'd audition and zane had gone missing at one point so i knew him and his story and um i was in spain when they came to audition for me the first time and i remember seeing them walk around and as they walked towards me i was literally praying please god please god let them sing please god let them sing i want them to be good and they sang and i had my poker face on because i want to give it away and as they walked around the corner i jumped out my chair i went they are fantastic i just love them i just something about these boys i love them and i think they're going to do great and the deal was i just said to them do what you want and i'll advise a few songs but wear what you want say what you want just have fun and that was it honestly and once you know we'd signed the deal it was kind of you hand the baton over to them at that point it's like right run with it you've got the doors are open everyone wants to write for you everyone wants to produce for you the world kind of likes you already because of the show so just take it run with it and that's it um and then at the same time in in my life my career i'm still doing the same thing where i'm encouraging people with talent to run with your talent at the same time knowing that becoming well known has as you said a a dark side to it and everybody wants that now so it was that real i'm a liban so i'm i'm tipping the scales all the time what is the right thing to do and unfortunately um whether it's in show business whatever job you do you're going to have pressure and i guess all i can take from this experience is is anyone I work with you have to prepare them for it's not just success it's someone said this very wise which is what are you afraid what are you most afraid of are you afraid of not being successful or when you are successful retaining your success and I thought that was a very smart way of putting it because when you find someone who's got talent you can't hold on to them forever that is a fact unfortunately you have to let them go I can hear that it weighs heavily on you yeah it's just a very it's a very hard thing I mean even with my son you know there's going to be a point in his life where you know whatever he does in his life there's going to be pressure that comes with it what i can say to him is you know just stay grounded you know there's always going to be a temptation of certain things you know and and and always know you can come to me and i guess that's probably the most important thing is anyone i suppose now is saying to them if you've got any issues talk to me of all the great things that have happened in my life then there's those moments like you said my mom and dad things like that you know it's just life is shit when it happens like that you know and prompts a lot of soul searching yeah and i know it i mentioned to you before we started recording that lucy spraggen came on how to fail and obviously went through a horrendously traumatic time yeah speak so highly of you and how you were the first person to call and how much that meant to her and i know you walked down the aisle recently and you're very good friends and so much work has been done on mental health of reality tv contestants in the time since these shows started yeah and and i get the impression from you that it's taken very seriously now you take it very seriously well i think you know we've all been we were all affected by it you know looking back myself included by the way You know, I mean, I went through my own dark times, you know, genuinely, where particularly, like I said, after I lost my parents, you know, there was a moment where I just was so depressed and down and, you know, nothing made you feel better.

46:58however having said that i would do it all over again a hundred percent i have no regrets you know changing my life at that moment becoming well known even with some of the stuff that goes with it i've just dealt with it and i can't complain because you meet really nice people every day genuinely everyone's really nice to you in return i try and be nice back to them i've never said no ever to a selfie or a handshake or an autograph and i always say to every person who i work with don't ever complain about people asking for photographs or this or that or moan about privacy because if you want privacy be an accountant if you want to be you know well known that's what comes with it.

47:51The public are the people who pay your wages. So in return, you have to be nice to them. It's as simple as that.

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49:31Your final failure is the US launch of the X Factor. Oh God. Why have you chosen this as a failure?

49:43That was a big one. that i was obnoxious then the show was doing great and we were getting lots of calls about launching in america

50:00so instead of doing it well in the way we should have done which is kind of like let's just not tell anyone let's just put the show out and hopefully a few people like it and tell your friends they like it we did the opposite i made this really flashy promo i did i stupidly in a press interview because someone said you know how will you know if it's a success or a failure and i said if it does has less than 20 million viewers it's a failure and they picked up on that and and that was it that was the story that ran so i think it got somewhere like between 14 and 16 million people and it was dead on arrival basically simon said if it gets us in 20 minutes a failure so it's a failure so everyone's heads went down look the show did fine having said that if i was doing it all over again yes i wouldn't have done it like that i would have literally not done told anyone really about it not done much promo put the show out in a good time slot, hopefully have great people on it, and then surprise people, I guess.

51:16I think that would have been the cooler way of doing it. Because around this time, I'm guessing social media was becoming so much more of a thing. And I wonder how much pressure that placed you under as well. Well, I mean, look, we all hyped ourselves up, basically. I had over 100 people working at the company at that point. Too many people, by the way. It was like a machine, you know? and um i guess we thought we were bigger than everybody else and in hindsight we weren't the voice came along it was like being punched in the face because it was so good and i was so unhappy because it was such a brilliant idea and our show just i don't know it just it wasn't great and I felt it and it was probably, it was like publicly being humiliated because I kind of set it up to fail really and that's a shame.

52:12I wish I could have done it all over again. It's almost like it was that moment again where you're in your Porsche and the roof was down and someone in the pub shouted you're a wanker. Yeah. Yeah. There's just a lot more people saying wanker at that point. And it was interesting because Jeremy Clarkson sort of did the same thing with Top Gear when they launched whatever it was called. It's a horrible title, by the way. Oh, the Grand Tour. Yeah, horrible name. Yeah. Because I guess they couldn't remake Top Gear in the same way and let people discover it. And I think that's an important word, discovery, which is don't tell people what they're going to like.