Cheryl’s secret talks with Simon
She’s turning to the big boss to boost her career
ime was when Cheryl was invincible – every song she released was a huge hit, every outfit she wore sold out in seconds, and her weekly judging stint on The X Factor charmed the nation. But it’s been
Tover a decade since those glory days, and now she lives a pretty quiet life with her three-year-old son Bear, while any recent attempts to revive her career haven’t worked out quite as she’d hoped. Her most recent single failed to even break the UK top 50, while TV show The Greatest Dancer, which promised to be her big television comeback, was cancelled earlier this year.
So, what’s a girl to do – throw in the towel? Not our Cheryl. Instead, she’s reaching out to the man who launched her career into the stratosphere in the first place: the one and only Simon Cowell. And, luckily for her, the showbiz supremo – who was seen out for the first time last week after breaking his back in August, when he fell off his electric bike – happens to have some extra time on his hands as he continues to recover.
“Simon is incredibly loyal to Cheryl and has told her he won’t give up on her,” says an insider close to the 37-year-old singer, who saw her career skyrocket after Simon enlisted her as an X Factor judge in 2008. “She would never press him while he’s still recuperating, but she’s hopeful he can work with her when he’s better. He’s encouraging her to visit him in LA, and bring Bear along, too, so they can get down to planning her future.”
Cheryl has always looked up to Simon as a friend and mentor, but their bond was seriously tested in 2011, when he hired and then swiftly fired her from the US X Factor. She has since referred to him as her “frenemy” and, heat is told, has never quite forgiven him for publicly humiliating her. But according to our source, Simon is desperate to make things right and reckons that now is the perfect time to redeem himself.
“Simon still feels bad about the US X Factor and he can see that Cheryl has been struggling for a while now,” says our insider. “He’s told her that she has a bright future ahead, but she needs to let go of the pop career and concentrate on television. It’s a tough pill for Cheryl to swallow, but she will take it from Simon – if there’s one thing she knows about him, it’s that he is brutally honest.” ■
‘Simon has told Cheryl he won’t give up on her’