Simon Cowell is a changed man.
The “America’s Got Talent” judge became a father when he and fiancée Lauren Silverman welcomed their son, Eric, 10 years ago, adjusting his worldview forever.
“Twenty years ago, I would have said I didn’t think I was going to have kids because I thought I was too old,” Cowell told Hello.
“So, when I got the news I was going to be a dad – and the first time I saw his scan – I was literally obsessed. Something changed, and I looked at life in a completely different way.”
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He added, “Every decision I make now, I am thinking about Eric. Is it the right decision for him?”
Cowell rose to fame as the tough “mean” judge on “American Idol” when the singing competition debuted in 2002.
Tossing off blunt critiques and often harsh quips, Cowell stayed with the show for eight years before moving on as an equally tough judge on “The X Factor” and finally “America’s Got Talent.”
Over time, he’s never lost his edge as a judge, but he admitted he has softened with fatherhood.
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At first, Cowell admitted to having fears as a new parent.
Speaking with Entertainment Tonight in 2016, Cowell said, “The first eight, nine months, I was kind of thinking, I don’t think he likes me very much.”
He continued, “He does remind me of me when I was younger because he knows how to try it on, how to get away with things. So I said to him the other day, ‘What does daddy do for work?’ [He said,] ‘You press buttons.’”
Pressing buttons could certainly describe Cowell’s onscreen persona in the past, but the producer has clarified over the years that he’s different when cameras aren’t around.
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In an interview with People when his son was around 2, Cowell said, “I think ‘X Factor’ and ‘Idol’ were edited so that I was always seen as this bad-tempered, miserable whatever, which of course I am at times, but I’m not like that the whole day.”
“But on ‘AGT,’ there are so many feel-good moments that they show those more than me ripping people to pieces because they are rubbish,” he added.
Cowell also noted that he’s “very conscious that the kids who audition for ‘AGT’ want to be there, they’re not being pushed into it, and that they’re having a great day out, otherwise we wouldn’t see them.”
Mike Darnell, an executive from Fox who worked with Cowell on “American Idol” and “X Factor” confirmed in 2022 that Cowell “learned the character” in an interview with Deadline in 2022.
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While he already had a “frank” tone, Darnell wanted to lean into it to cement his star factor.
“I knew we had to get Simon Cowell, as he was the star of the show, but we needed something different in the U.S.,” Darnell said, referring to Cowell’s appearance on “Pop Idol,” the U.K. pre-cursor to “American Idol.”
“The mean judge, the frank judge. In all the other shows before him, everyone was polite and nice, and I knew that was going to be [his] thing. Simon, to his credit, was willing to do anything.”
He added that “underneath, he’s a different character,” saying “Watch ‘Britain’s Got Talent’ or ‘America’s Got Talent’ now, and he’s a much softer version now.”
In 2018, Cowell spoke with the Daily Mail about how parenthood changed him and even affected some of his decision-making while he was judging on “Britain’s Got Talent.”
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At the time, he had just given a Golden Buzzer on “Britain’s Got Talent” to a father and son singing team.
“But there was this kid, and I was thinking, ‘God, that literally could be Eric.’ It wouldn’t be me as the dad, but it could be Eric,” Cowell said.
“People have asked me if I have changed since I have had Eric, and of course you do, you can’t help it.”
He continued, “In a very positive way you start, particularly now he’s 4, looking at the world through his eyes as well, which is fun because we get to watch great movies together.”
Parenthood isn’t the only thing that’s changed his approach to life. Cowell’s partnership with his fiancée, Silverman, has also had a great impact. She told Hello, “He would stay up until crazy hours and sometimes wake up to 2 o’clock in the afternoon. But obviously, I’m a mom and life doesn’t work that way.
“I always try to help him to find that balance, because he’s a workaholic,” Silverman continued. “He loves his work, which is fantastic. But he sometimes needs me and Eric to push him to do more normal things and get up at a reasonable hour. And I guess in that sense, we’ve helped him; and he’s definitely got a lot better since we first met, that’s for sure.”
Cowell and Silverman, an American socialite, started as friends in 2004, when she was still married to husband Andrew Silverman.
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They reportedly began dating in 2012, and their affair was made public in 2013 when headlines revealed Lauren was pregnant with Cowell’s child.
At the “X Factor” TCA panel in 2013, Cowell addressed the headlines, saying, per Us Weekly, “I would love to [talk], but I have to respect a lot of people’s feelings right now. [There‘s] a lot of things I will eventually clear up when the time is right, but I really have to be sensitive because there’s a lot of people’s feelings involved here.”
Silverman’s ex filed for divorce, and the matter was settled out of court. A statement from Silverman’s lawyers said at the time, “The matter has been resolved and the parties have moved on.”
Cowell admitted to Hello that Silverman helped him through dark times after the death of his father, Eric, who their son is named after, in 1999, and his mother’s death in 2015.
“When it got quite dark, everything kind of opened up for me. I hoped something good would happen because I remember when I was working flat out, even though everything was going fine, I was miserable because I think I was actually physically and mentally exhausted,” Cowell said.
Silverman added, “I think before he had Eric his life was great, and he had so much success. But there was definitely a void, something missing. And maybe he didn’t even know what that thing was.”
“But once he became a dad and had someone like me to answer to, he realized that actually there’s so much more to life and what’s the point of having all this if you don’t have somebody you want to share it with?”
In 2018, during his Hollywood Walk of Fame ceremony, Cowell praised Silverman for being “his rock.”
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“Lauren, you’ve been my rock for the past few years, put up with everything I put up with,” he said, per People. “I suppose one thing I was also thinking about today was who would have got a bigger kick out of this? My mom and dad, and they’re not here, but I have a feeling they’re looking down, and now I can look over to my son, Eric, and say, ‘Maybe one day you’ll get one of these as well.’”
Cowell proposed to Silverman in 2022 on Christmas Eve in Barbados, where they first met.
The 64-year-old has also spoken candidly about his mental health in recent years and about attending therapy with his now-fiancée by his side.
In an interview with “Extra,” last year, Cowell detailed how his mental health dropped during the pandemic, which drove him to seek therapy.
“It has been good for both of us,” he told the outlet, “In fact, we did do this thing where both of us go in. … There was one point when we were together, and I looked at the two therapists and their faces were like … and when we got out, we both cracked up and said, ‘God, what must they be thinking?’”
He continued, “Then I spoke to my therapist afterward, and he said, ‘Honestly, Simon, that was nothing,’ but it is healthy to go somewhere and let it all out.”
Cowell added later, “If I’m being honest, probably 20, 25 years ago. If you’ve got a family, you’re working, everyone does get stressed, and the idea that you bottle everything up and, like I said, after everything we went through with COVID, you’ve really got to look after your mind.”
