A big win for Southern Hicks
Fresh from winning a record contract as the new “American Idol,” Taylor Hicks can’t wait to get started.
“I’m heading to the studio as quickly as I can,” he says. “But I’ll take a few days off to clear my head.”
He wants to record a “really good” album, “with soul,” adds Hicks, 29, whose fans became known as the “Soul Patrol.”
And he would love to tour with the likes of John Legend and John Mayer, he says.
The Alabama-born Hicks, the latest in a string of Southern and Midwestern contestants to win the Fox TV talent competition, leaned over emotionally when host Ryan Seacrest announced his victory Wednesday night.
“I was just telling myself, ‘Don’t fall to the floor. Don’t let my knees buckle,’ ” he says.
Wednesday’s show drew an average audience of 36.4 million people, making it the second most-watched “Idol” finale ever, behind only 2003’s competition. Last year’s finale, won by Carrie Underwood, was seen by 30.3 million.
Just another pretty woman
Meanwhile, runner-up Katharine McPhee was taking it all in stride, saying she didn’t really expect to win and had no regrets.
“It would really just be silly to feel bad for me at this point. I got a record deal, a new car,” she said.
McPhee, 22, said she planned to take a week off to see friends in New York and “go somewhere tropical” before embarking on the “American Idol” tour with the other finalists.
As for the future, she said she wanted to model her career after Julia Roberts and eventually go into movies.
Going to the Dawg
Mariah Carey is tapping “American Idol” judge Randy Jackson, a longtime friend, to help her mix things up a bit on her “Adventures of Mimi” tour, which kicks off in August.
Carey and Jackson have been meeting to discuss how she’ll spice up some of her old hits, and he might even join her on a few dates.
“Randy Jackson is my musical director, and he has been for many years, even before ‘American Idol,’ ” said Carey, who hasn’t toured since 2003.
Fat chance
Janet Jackson, newly svelte after losing 60 pounds, says she gained weight for a role in the upcoming movie “Tennessee” – which she ended up passing on because of her new album.
“(The producers) wanted to see me in a different light, as a heavier woman,” the 40-year-old singer, who weighed about 180 pounds at her heaviest, tells Us magazine.
But when Jackson got too busy with her new CD, due for release in September, the role instead went to … Mariah Carey.
Quoteworthy
Taylor Hicks, after his “American Idol” win: “Stars do fall on Alabama.”
The birthday bunch
Actor James Arness is 83. Sportscaster Brent Musburger is 67. Singer-drummer Levon Helm (The Band) is 66. Singer Stevie Nicks is 58. Actor Philip Michael Thomas (“Miami Vice”) is 57. Actress Pam Grier is 57. Country singer Hank Williams Jr. is 57. Comedian Bobcat Goldthwait is 44. Singer Lenny Kravitz is 42. Actress Helena Bonham Carter is 40. Actor Joseph Fiennes (“Shakespeare in Love”) is 36. “South Park” co-creator Matt Stone is 35.