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Simon Cowell
Name: Simon Cowell
DOB: 7 October 1959
Birth Place: Lambeth, London, United Kingdom
Claim to fame: Music mogul, TV producer, entrepreneur, and the nastiest talent judge on television
Star Facts
- With a personal fortune of £200 million, Simon is the sixth richest person in the British music industry
- He is the godfather to all of Sinitta's adopted children
- Simon has admitted that he uses Botox
- Simon has appeared as a guest voice in Family Guy and in two episodes of The Simpsons
Biography
Born in October 1959 in Lambeth, TV’s Mr. Nasty and multimillionaire media mogul Simon Cowell had a fortuitous start in life. His dad worked for the recording giant EMI, which is sure to help on the road to becoming one of the world’s leading music industry executives.
Simon grew up in Elstree and worked for a time as a runner at Elstree Studios, working on films including The Shining. He made the switch to the music biz after his dad landed him a job as assistant to an A&R man. From there he just kept working his way up, forming his own music publishing companies and record labels along the way.
En route to his global megastardom as The X Factor creator and star, Simon signed up shedloads of successful pop acts, including Westlife, Five, Sonia, Curiosity Killed The Cat, Sinitta and Robson & Jerome.
He became a household name in 2001 when he landed his first TV judging role on ITV’s Pop Idol. His notoriously harsh putdowns and non-nonsense attitude soon saw him dubbed TV’s Mr. Nasty and led to many further talent show roles.
Since then Cowell has appeared as a judge and/or executive produced American Idol, Britain’s Got Talent, America’s Got Talent, American Inventor, Celebrity Duets and Grease Is The Word. His personal fortune now stands at around £200 million. But he still wears his trousers too high.