After eight seasons of evaluating talent, often leaning more to the nurturing than critiquing, American Idol judge Paula Abdul has decided to call it quits.
While Fox has reportedly offered her a contract, she has declined their offer, tweeting on Twitter yesterday, “With sadness in my heart, I’ve decided not to return to #IDOL. I’ll miss nurturing all the new talent, but most of all being a part of a show that I helped from day 1 become an international phenomenon.”
On Tuesday morning, Fox announced that fellow judge Kara DioGuardi had accepted a new contract, following Idol host Ryan Seacrest’s huge $15M contract that he signed last month. Judges Randy Jackson and Simon Cowell are under contract through the end of next season.
Abdul was often quirky and her comments were often strange, prompting people to wonder what, exactly she had in that Coke cup she had in front of her. She had no problem getting up and dancing if a particular song moved her to do so, and she often got very emotional when talking to the contestants.
But, through all that, she did manage to provide a voice of reason on occasion when Cowell would get out of hand, or if Jackson and Cowell couldn’t agree on a contestant. In her first season, DioGuardi hasn’t shown that she can do that yet. Fox hasn’t announced whether they’ll stick with the three judges, as they had for their first seven seasons, or whether they’ll hire another 4th judge to replace Abdul.
