Nigel Lythgoe
Birth name: Nigel Lythgoe
Birth place: The Wirral, England
Birthday: 9 July 1949
Profession: Producer; director; choreographer; dancer
Years active: 1969-present
Most Recent Role: Judge on ‘So You Think You Can Dance.’
Dancing was a passion for him and that showed ever since he was child. From his early childhood, Nigel showed invariable interest in dancing and at the age of ten he decided to take formal training in tap and jazz and European folk. He then went to the Hylton-Bromley School of Theatre Dance on Merseyside, where he studied dance. After completing his studies, he took training for several months from Joanne Steuer and Molly Molloy.
The year that he got lucky was 1969 when Nigel got a chance to perform and choreograph for the BBC Young Generation dance troupe. After which there was no looking back for Nigel. Very early in his career he learnt the use of multi cameras that helped him with choreography and later in his television career.
The glorious period of his life was the 70’s and 80’s when he got the opportunity to perform with dancers from Cyd Charisse to Gene Kelly. He also choreographed dances for Ben Vereen, Shirley Bassey and most importantly for the Muppets. Later Nigel moved on to television where in 1996 he was the head of Entertainment and Comedy at London Weekend Television. It was under his leadership that shows like Gladiators and Blind Date, were produced.
He then moved from, London Weekend Television to Bob Geldof’s television company, Planet 24 and then to Simon Fuller’s 19 Entertainment group. His popularity among people came when he became the judge of ITV1 show ‘Popstars’.
Currently, Nigel is the president of 19 Television, where he brought the culture of reality shows in America. At present he is the producer and the judge of the reality show ‘So You Think You Can Dance’ which airs on FOX television network.
Coming down to his personal life, Nigel married Bonnie Lythgoe, in 1974. He met Bonnie while he was choreographer for the BBC’s ‘Young Generation’ dance troupe. The couple has two sons and four grandchildren.
[...] it was also reported that Katie has joined hands with Adam Shankman, Nigel Lythgoe and Carrie Ann Inaba to launch a dance scholarship for the underprivileged youth. Incidentally, [...]
July 14th, 2009 at 4:36 am[...] them will get a ticket to Las Vegas, where the next round will be held. Cole Clemens, who used Nigel Lythgoe’s usual line of “Cue, music” was told that he wasn’t what the judges were looking [...]
September 16th, 2009 at 3:58 am