TALENT SPOTTERS
SIMON BELIEVED WALLIAMS COWELL DAVID COULD SURPRISE NOT HIM ANY MORE. MARION McMULLEN FINDS OUT HOW A LAP DANCE PROVED THE BRITAIN’S GOT TALENT JUDGE WRONG
BRITAIN’S GOT TALENT Tonight, ITV, 8pm
YOGA-LOVING dogs, a dancing robot and the sound of golden buzzers can only mean one thing... Britain’s Got Talent is back. Simon Cowell jokes that he almost ended up in therapy after fellow judge David Walliams dropped his trousers and did an impromptu lap dance for him during auditions for the talent competition.
But Simon says he managed to avoid seeing more than he wanted to and exclaims: “Thank God I had my eyes shut for that! He did a lap dance on the desk, thank God I didn’t see it, or I would be in therapy right now!
“That’s David though, it’s what he does.”
Simon says he has become used to the way the comedy performer tries to dance with him on the ITV show.
“The first year it was a bit weird, but now I’ve realised that the more you say no, the more he does it,” he says. “I just don’t say anything, as long as we can get the show made, I’m happy!”
David agrees: “I don’t think he’s that surprised every time I do something awful because he’s come to expect it.
“But I suppose he probably thought it was a new low, even for me, but it felt funny at the time!
“It was midnight on the 10th day of auditions and we were all a bit hysterical!”
Their fellow judge Amanda Holden, who will be joined on the panel once again by Alesha Dixon, reveals she gave David a little helping hand when he started pulling his trousers down.
She says: “He was doing one of his normal lap dances he does to try and entice Simon over to the other side of the desk and he dropped his trousers.
“That was a mistake because he was right next to me when he was doing this. So I thought, ‘If you’re really going to go there David, let’s get everything off’.
“So I pulled his pants down! He just saved his modesty, but apparently one of the sound guys said he saw a little too much and has been in therapy ever since!”
She laughs: “This year I think we have seen a little too much of David!”
The winner of the new series will be awarded £250,000 in prize money and the opportunity to perform at the Royal Variety Performance this year.
The past decade has seen the show discover all manner of winners from opera singer Paul Potts and dance group Diversity, to dog act Ashleigh & Pudsey and magician Lance Corporal Richard Jones.
And it’s not only the winners who have produced some memorable TV moments. There was superstar singer Susan Boyle, young comedian Jack Carroll, magician Darcy Oake and, of course, the dog that hypnotised Simon.
Presenters Ant and Dec confess one of their dogs had an unfortunate moment this series when they did a “massive wee” on stage during the London auditions.
Dec says: “We had a bring-yourdog-to-work day. That day someone was auditioning doing doggy yoga. So we all got our dogs up on stage and it didn’t go quite to plan.”
David says of the incident: “We were asked to bring our dogs up on stage, we had to take our shoes off and the lady’s dog went for a pee on my shoes. Then Ant’s dog, he’s got a big Labrador, did the longest pee ever, literally like 10 minutes, it went on forever.”
Meanwhile, Britain’s Got Talent boss Simon swears his young son Eric is a chip off the old block when it comes to spotting star potential.
The music mogul took his threeyear-old along to auditions in London earlier this year and says the toddler already has a “good eye and ear” for acts... although he admits Eric initially thought daddy’s job only involved pressing buttons.
“Eric does enjoy coming down to auditions,” says Simon. “The first time I brought him to Britain’s Got Talent he thought it was scary because of the big red Xs, but then after a few months I said, ‘What does Daddy do when he goes to work?’, and he said I pressed buttons – it’s a little more than that!
“Now, he understands the show so I watch him and I’m like, ‘Eric do you like it? Don’t you like it?’.
“He’s got a really good eye and ear for it, so yes, he’s going to be doing this one day.”
Simon became a first-time father when he and girlfriend Lauren Silverman welcomed Eric on Valentine’s Day in 2014.
Amanda agrees that the toddler has a knack for spotting winners and says: “I think he’s got an eye for talent and a great sense of humour.”
She says Eric is “very cute” but “runs a mile” from her when she enters a room. “Rightly so because he knows me, but he doesn’t know me that well. I’m like, ‘Give me a kiss Eric!’, and he’s like, ‘No!’. “That’s right, he should be like that. It’s just like Simon, he runs a mile from me as well!”