‘American Idol’ Producer Nigel Lythgoe Claims Paula Abdul Fabricated ‘Appalling Lies’ & Changed Details In Her Assault Lawsuit Against Him

American Idol producer Nigel Lythgoe declared that Paula Abdul altered the details in the assault lawsuit she filed against him.

Abdul’s lawsuit was filed on December 29, 2023, and described two sexual assault incidents.

Lythgoe denied her claims and told media outlets he was “shocked and saddened by the allegations made against [him].” He noted that he and the American singer “have interacted as dear, and entirely platonic, friends and colleagues.”

In the first lawsuit, Abdul alleges that the American Idol producer “shoved Abdul against the wall, then grabbed her private area and began shoving his tongue down her throat.” She told one of her representatives about the incident but “ultimately decided not to take action for fear that Lythgoe would have her fired from American Idol.“

The second incident allegedly happened when the singer was a  So You Think You Can Dance judge. Lythgoe reportedly invited her to his residence for dinner, where he then allegedly “forced himself on top of Abdul while she was seated on his couch and attempted to kiss her while proclaiming that the two would make an excellent ‘power couple.'”

According to documents filed to the L.A. Superior Court, Lythgoe explicitly denied Abdul’s claims, calling them “false, despicable, intolerable, and life-changing… the worst form of character assassination.”

On Tuesday, he filed court documents in which he called out Abdul’s memory of a supposed 2015 incident in Las Vegas. 

She originally said that she saw the producer groping her assistant during a So You Think You Can Dance shoot, which he rejected when she first filed her lawsuit.

However, her story changed nine months later when she filed an amended lawsuit, accusing Lythgoe of also sexually assaulting her in Vegas. 

Abdul claimed that after the assistant rejected him, the producer touched her hips and waist and attempted to kiss her on the neck.

“It stretches credulity that Abdul would supposedly remember witnessing her assistant allegedly being assaulted … and yet apparently ‘forget’ until the filing of [amended complaint] that she also allegedly was assaulted at the same time,” Lythgoe states in his court documents.

He accuses the singer of fabricating this new version of her story in order to keep her lawsuit alive.

He also mentions in the documents that the “shifting allegations” damage her credibility.

The producer also claimed that he thinks he is the “victim of Abdul’s appalling lies.”