Whilst still an extremely successful man in the music, entertainment, and TV industries, Simon Cowell over the past year has been slipping a little in the latter category, with his previously untouchable brands either collapsing or starting to show signs of wear.
Though still a strong success with its current season airing in no less than 147 countries and territories (and 51 global franchises at present), The X Factor, fresh of the premature demise of its American franchise after just 3 seasons on Fox, is running its 11th season in its home market of the UK, but finding itself struggling against a baking competition.
The final episode of the 5th season of the BBC‘s show The Great British Bake Off, aired weekly between August-October, is one which attracted an average of 12.3 million viewers, making it the UK’s biggest broadcast of the year outside of sporting events, with even the season average of around 9.9 million managing to surpass numbers managed by The X Factor’s first live results show this weekend, which drew an average of 8.49 million, in spite of the former airing Wednesday prime-time compared with the latter’s Sunday prime-time slot.
However, Simon Cowell has refused to accept that The Great British Bake Off could be seen as a challenger to The X Factor‘s decade-long domination of the reality TV contest market in the UK, claiming that the BBC One effort is not as ‘exciting’ as the show he provides for commercial broadcaster ITV. As he would never think to use cooking abilities as a source of entertainment.
Speaking in an interview with Piers Morgan at the ‘Mipcom TV’ programming conference event in Cannes (France) on Monday (13 October), Cowell gave his perspective of the differences between the programmes, stating: “My belief is it’s more exciting to see someone like Leona Lewis win and sing a fantastic song, than looking at a chocolate eclair at the end of the show.”
The ratings, obviously, do not agree, with critics of The X Factor citing the lack of any Leona Lewis-level breakout stars in recent seasons as part of a reason for its decline, alongside . Cowell, meanwhile, believes it is the concept of celebrity judges that has contributed to the lessened interest of TV talent shows, but claims that it is other shows in the entertainment genre that have been guilty of this.
The man who this year hired former Girls Aloud singer Cheryl and former Spice Girl Mel B to sit with him on The X Factor panel this season added: “We’ve got to a stage now with certain shows that the panels are so celebrity-driven. I always had a feeling about putting too many artists on a panel. Artists don’t want to find other artists. It’s not in them. But for me, I run a record label, so it’s all I want to do.”
He noted of the global success that The X Factor has: “[The X Factor has] set the benchmark all over the world for finding and launching international superstars. These shows were created to find artists like One Direction, Leona Lewis, Olly Murs, Little Mix and Ella Henderson who go on to sell millions of records. I’m delighted the UK show is being watched all over the world – as well as there being so many fantastic local versions of X Factor as well.”
Continuing next weekend with the second set of live shows (with 14 contestants currently remaining in their attempts to vye for the SyCo record contract prize), the ITV show is still one of ITV’s biggest draws for regular ratings, but will it be able to make a statement now viewers will no longer have their minds on a mid-week cake dosage? They have to do without the most headline-worthy of their finalists:
