Nearly eight years before Paula Abdul accused Nigel Lythgoe of sexual assault, he made a questionable joke about their relationship.
After Abdul, now 61, joined the So You Think You Can Dance panel in 2015, she and Lythgoe, now 74, spoke to Us Weekly and other reporters about working together on the show.
“What chemistry? But really, we’ve known each other for so long now,” Lythgoe quipped to Us in January 2015. “I was always an admirer of Paula back in the U.K. before I came here, and to be able to work with her [as an executive producer] on Idol for all those years and see how she was mistreated by Simon [Cowell].”
Lythgoe worked behind the scenes on American Idol during its early seasons when Abdul served as a judge alongside Cowell and Randy Jackson. Abdul, who ultimately left the singing show in 2009, chimed in to jokingly claim that she had been “abused” by Cowell.
Lythgoe, for his part, corrected himself during the press junket. “Abused and mistreated,” he added. “I wanted to be the next person to abuse her some more.”
The off-kilter comment resurfaced after Us confirmed on Saturday, December 30, that Abdul filed a lawsuit against Lythgoe, suing him for sexual assault/battery, sexual harassment, gender violence and negligence. She alleged that he sexually assaulted her twice, once when they worked together on American Idol and a second time during their shared SYTYCD tenure around 2015.
Lythgoe vehemently denied Abdul’s allegations, calling them “deeply offensive” and “untrue.”
“To say that I am shocked and saddened by the allegations made against me by Paula Abdul is a wild understatement. For more than two decades, Paula and I have interacted as dear — and entirely platonic — friends and colleagues,” Lythgoe told Us in a statement. “Yesterday, however, out of the blue, I learned of these claims in the press and I want to be clear: not only are they false, they are deeply offensive to me and to everything I stand for.”
He added: “While Paula’s history of erratic behavior is well known, I can’t pretend to understand exactly why she would file a lawsuit that she must know is untrue. But I can promise that I will fight this appalling smear with everything I have.”
Abdul’s lawsuit was filed under California’s Sexual Abuse and Cover-Up Accountability Act, which allowed victims a one-year window to file sexual abuse lawsuits that would otherwise be outside of the statute of limitations. The deadline expires on Sunday, December 31.
If you or someone you know has been sexually assaulted, contact the National Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673).
