The American singer, dancer and talent show judge Paula Abdul is suing the British television executive Nigel Lythgoe over alleged sexual assault, according to US media.
Abdul filed a lawsuit on Friday in Los Angeles County, claiming multiple instances of assault while the pair worked together on the hit shows American Idol and So You Think You Can Dance.
Lythgoe was an executive producer of the Fox singing talent show and a co-judge on the latter.
Abdul has not publicly commented on the case and did not respond to requests for comment from various media organisations.
In the lawsuit, Abdul alleges the first instance of assault happened during “one of the first seasons” of American Idol in the early 2000s while she and her boss were on the road for regional auditions, entertainment news website TMZ reported.
Abdul claims Lythgoe assaulted her in a lift at their hotel, but that she was able to escape when the doors opened. She says she immediately informed her representatives from her hotel room, before deciding to keep quiet about the incident, fearing she could be sacked. The lawsuit reportedly claims that another incident of assault occurred more than a decade later, during what Abdul thought was a professional meeting at Lythgoe’s Los Angeles home, where he allegedly forced himself on her and told her they would make an “excellent power couple”.
According to reports, Abdul responded by pushing him off and explaining that she was not interested, before leaving.
Abdul reportedly claims she witnessed Lythgoe assault one of his assistants that same year in Las Vegas, during the filming of So You Think You Can Dance.
The lawsuit also claims Lythgoe “taunted” Abdul by calling her and telling her that the pair should celebrate because it had been “seven years and the statute of limitations had run [out]”.
On Sunday, Lythgoe said: “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. 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.
“While Paula’s history of erratic behaviour 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 is reportedly suing Lythgoe – and the shows’ production companies 19 Entertainment, FremantleMedia North America, American Idol Productions and Dance Nation Productions – for sexual assault and battery, sexual harassment, gender violence and negligence.
Lythgoe was reportedly fired from American Idol in 2013 after 12 years as a producer on the show.
According to US media, the court filing states that Abdul has remained silent for years due to “fear of speaking out against one of the most well-known producers of television competition shows who could easily break her career”, as well as professional contracts that “prohibited” her disclosing “anything that might be deemed confidential business information” or “derogatory”.
The lawsuit was reportedly filed under California’s Sexual Abuse and Cover Up Accountability Act, which, since it came into effect a year ago, has allowed people to bring legal action in cases of sexual assault, even after the statute of limitations has expired.
