World Idol

World Idol (Courtesy Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)

World Idol (Germany: SuperStar Weltweit, Middle East: SuperStar El Alaam) was the title of a one-off international version of the television show Pop Idol, featuring winners of the various national Idol shows around the world competing against each other.

The performance show was held on Christmas Day 2003, with the results show held on New Year's Day 2004. It was made in the UK, using the set from the recently completed second series of Pop Idol. After presenting the competitors, viewers from the 11 participating countries were allowed to vote by telephone, but not for the participant from their home country. All participants sang in English except for Diana Karazon, who sang in Arabic.

British presenters Ant and Dec hosted the show in all English speaking countries, while local presenters hosted for their own country in the local language. The only exception to Ant and Dec's English speaking role was that CTV edited the show in Canada to use Canadian Idol host Ben Mulroney instead (the show on Fox, which used Ant and Dec as hosts, was not simulcast with the CTV feed, to prevent Canadians from calling the American toll-free number to vote for Ryan Malcolm). Victoria Beckham performed her UK #3 hit Let Your Head Go during the results interval.

Simon Cowell, who judged American Idol as well as the original Pop Idol, was very critical of the format. He went as far as to say he hated it, in that it made the winners from the ten other Idol competitions into losers. Cowell also thought many of the judges were trying to copy his abrasive style. Television critics also panned the programme, particularly as the UK phone voting was profit-making, whereas tradition dictates that Christmas specials of such programmes donate profits to charity.

The show was broadcast on 11 television broadcasters worldwide.

Results

The points were awarded in a similar fashion as the Eurovision Song Contest, i.e. each country awarded an amount of points from 1 to 10 to each other country, using each number once. The results were:

Points Given	Germany	Australia	Pan-Arabia	Canada	Netherlands	South Africa	Poland	USA	Belgium	UK	Norway	Total	Place
Alexander Klaws	12	1	10	1	4	2	4	1	7	2	1	45	9
Guy Sebastian	2	12	2	6	6	5	5	6	3	6	3	56	7
Diana Karazon	6	4	12	5	1	1	1	8	1	4	2	45	9
Ryan Malcolm	3	5	9	12	5	7	2	4	2	5	8	62	6
Jamai Loman	1	2	1	2	12	4	3	2	4	1	4	36	11
Heinz Winkler	7	8	8	7	2	12	6	9	8	7	6	80	4
Alicja Janosz	8	3	7	3	3	3	12	3	5	3	5	55	8
Kelly Clarkson	9	9	5	9	9	8	8	12	9	9	10	97	2
Peter Evrard	4	7	6	8	7	6	9	7	12	8	9	83	3
Will Young	5	6	3	4	8	9	7	5	6	12	7	72	5
Kurt Nilsen	10	10	4	10	10	10	10	10	10	10	12	106	1

_{Each country's Idol automatically gained the maximum 12 points. Therefore the most points an Idol could gain from another country was 10}

Rank	Performer	Country	Points	Song	Original artist
1	Kurt Nilsen		106	"Beautiful Day"	U2
2	Kelly Clarkson		97	"(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman"	Aretha Franklin
3	Peter Evrard		83	"Lithium"	Nirvana
4	Heinz Winckler		80	"I Don't Want to Miss a Thing"	Aerosmith
5	Will Young		72	"Light My Fire"	The Doors
6	Ryan Malcolm		62	"He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother"	The Hollies
7	Guy Sebastian		56	"What a Wonderful World"	Louis Armstrong
8	Alicja "Alex" Janosz		55	"I Don't Know How to Love Him"	from Jesus Christ Superstar
T9	Alexander Klaws		45	"Maniac"	Michael Sembello
T9	Diana Karazon	Arab States	45	"Ensani Ma Binsak"	original song
11	Jamai Loman		36	"Sorry Seems to Be the Hardest Word"	Elton John

Judges

The judges of the competition were:

Randall Abrahams (South Africa)
Simon Cowell (representing United States, is also judge on original UK show)
Nina De Man (Belgium)
Ian "Dicko" Dickson (Australia)
Shona Fraser (Germany)
Jan Fredrik Karlsen (Norway)
Elias Rahbani (Lebanon)
Henkjan Smits (Netherlands)
Pete Waterman (United Kingdom)
Zack Werner (Canada)
Kuba Wojewódzki (Poland)

Reception

Ratings

In Canada, the special was watched by 1.9 million viewers. In Poland, World Idol was the highest-rated in its timeslot, 4.5 million viewers, and 28.6 share percent. In the United States, World Idol was the number-one show of the night, among adults from 18-34. In Australia, it was the highest-rated show of the night, it had about 2.4 viewers in millions. In the Netherlands, it was the #1 rated show in its timeslot. Other countries also had good ratings during the Christmas period.