Todrick Hall might have taken Simon Cowell’s criticisms on the show like a champ, but that’s not to say he didn’t voice his frustrations soon after his elimination. Far from it. Speaking to Entertainment Weekly shortly after his departure, he shared that he believed the way Cowell had shared his views had impacted the audience’s perception of him.
“If he [had] said, ‘Todrick, you’re like the male Lady Gaga, you’re so over the top. You’re so theatrical and there’s no one else out there like that…,’ then a lot of people would respond to that,” Hall mused. However, as those who witnessed his journey on the show will remember, that’s not how it went down. Hall also told the outlet that, when Cowell had compared him to a Broadway star, he wasn’t doing so in a complimentary way, noting his “negative tone.” And, given Cowell’s influence, Hall explained that his elimination was inevitable. “I firmly believe that what Simon says … really, really influences America,” he pointed out at the time.
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That said, the criticisms were the spark Hall has since said he needed. “After I left ‘American Idol,’ that was the fire that was lit within me to say, ‘I have to prove Simon wrong one day,'” he told Metro in 2020. And, funnily enough, they went on to work together on “The Greatest Dancer,” with Hall as a judge and Cowell as producer. How’s that for flipping the script?
