Britney Spears reportedly nearly quit the US version of The X Factor on her first day! The singer had a panic attack and walked off the set within 20 minutes.
She signed a rumored $15 million contract to appear on the show, but that didn’t stop her insecurities from coming back.
Simon Cowell told TMZ, his team had to “half lie” when she walked off, claiming she needed to use the bathroom. So I guess the audience had to amuse themselves with http://www.foxybingo.com/ etc until she felt better!
“No one is going to admit that on the first day your highest paid star after only 20 minutes has walked off set. She had a moment on the first day where she said to me ‘I’m not sure I can do this.'”
It’s no surprise really, and with the amount of pressure that being a judge entails, we can’t hardly blame her. It does make you wonder if Mr Cowell is taking advantage of her fragility to make headlines and increase ratings. He could have easily kept this tid bit of information quiet.
Anyway Simon managed to talk her into coming back and filming the show. Surprisingly, she has proved to be quite a tough judge. Simon admitted that she’s a lot harder on the contestants than he thought she would be.
“You know how when you buy a dog, you expect it to lick you, and then it turns out to bite you? It was rather like that,” he said at a recent press conference. “It was a real surprise. She’s really, really difficult to please. But in a way I think it made it more interesting because she just wouldn’t say ‘Yes’ for people to like her. And when you do these auditions in front of 5,000 people, they boo you.”
I guess she has more guts than even Simon knew. The X Factor is back on our screens for its second season, September 12th. It features fellow judges Demi Lovato and LA Reid.
