{"id":776149,"date":"2026-02-20T02:22:20","date_gmt":"2026-02-20T02:22:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/776149\/"},"modified":"2026-02-20T02:22:20","modified_gmt":"2026-02-20T02:22:20","slug":"simon-cowell-and-lauren-silverman-cuddle-as-they-proudly-watch-december-10-storm-the-stage-in-london-after-creating-the-boyband-on-his-netflix-show","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/776149\/","title":{"rendered":"Simon Cowell and Lauren Silverman cuddle as they proudly watch December 10 storm the stage in London after creating the boyband on his Netflix show"},"content":{"rendered":"

Simon Cowell<\/a> and his partner Lauren Silverman<\/a> cuddled as they watched his new boyband December 10 take to the stage at the O2 Islington in London on Thursday.<\/p>\n

The music mogul, 66, created the seven part group on his Netflix<\/a> series, The Next Act, in a bid to try to emulate the success of One Direction.\u00a0<\/p>\n

After December 10 released their single Run My Way last month, Simon showed his support as the boys stopped in the capital on their tour.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The band, which consists of Cruz, 19, Danny, 17, Hendrick, 19, John, 17, Josh, 17, Nicolas, 16, and Sean, 19, put on an energetic performance.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The group sold out their live dates\u00a0across the UK and Ireland. They kicked off in Glasgow on 16 February and will finish in Dublin on 22 February.<\/p>\n

But their debut single\u00a0limped into the charts at number 72, shifting just 6,300 units (that’s physical sales, digital downloads and streaming) within seven days.<\/p>\n

\"Simon <\/p>\n

Simon Cowell and his partner Lauren Silverman cuddled as they watched his new boyband December 10 take to the stage at the O2 Islington in London on Thursday<\/p>\n

\"The <\/p>\n

The music mogul, 66, created the seven part group on his Netflix series, The Next Act, in a bid to try to emulate the success of One Direction<\/p>\n

Music industry insiders have described Simon’s latest project as a ‘catastrophe’ and a ‘disaster’. Even their future at EMI\/Universal is no longer as secure as Cowell would have perhaps hoped. You can read the full story here<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Netflix project came\u00a0five years after the closure of his music label, SyCo.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Over the years, Simon has created a number of successful groups and solo artists, including One Direction<\/a>, Little Mix<\/a>, Susan Boyle<\/a> and Westlife<\/a>\u00a0– which are\u00a0all down to shows such as ITV<\/a>‘s X Factor and the Got Talent franchise.<\/p>\n

On the show, Simon was joined on-screen by Lauren, 48, as well as a number of music industry professionals.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The likes of Savan Kotecha, Kamille, Poo Bear, Pete Waterman and Robert Stevenson appear on the doc alongside the entrepreneur.<\/p>\n

But the show was called ‘dated, derivative and as flat as his hairdo’ in a number of scathing reviews.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Metro<\/a>‘s Jon O’Brien wrote : ‘It\u2019s been four years since The X Factor was finally put out of its misery and a good dozen since its halcyon days, a period in which pop music, and its star-making methods, have significantly moved on from the bog-standard TV talent show.<\/p>\n

‘Unfortunately, no one seems to have told Simon Cowell.’<\/p>\n

\"After <\/p>\n

After December 10 released their single Run My Way last month, Simon showed his support as they stopped in the capital on their tour<\/p>\n

\"The <\/p>\n

The band, which consists of John Fadare, Danny Bretherton, Hendrik Christoffersen, Nicolas Alves, Cruz Lee-Ojo, Josh Olliver and Sean Hayden put on an energetic performance<\/p>\n

\"The <\/p>\n

The boys sold out their live dates across the UK and Ireland, kicking off in Glasgow on 16 February and they will finish in Dublin on 22 February<\/p>\n

Meanwhile The Telegraph<\/a>‘s Anita Singh’s headline stated : ‘Simon Cowell\u2019s comeback series is as flat as his hairdo.’<\/p>\n

She added: ‘Netflix attempts to recapture that X Factor magic, but this vanity project feels dated and derivative.’\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Guardian’s Stuart Heritage described the doc as ‘the billionth take on his one idea’.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile\u00a0Grazia<\/a>‘s Nikki Peach said : ‘The toxic 2010s called, they want Simon Cowell back.’\u00a0<\/p>\n

She added: ‘A few episodes later, it becomes apparent that Simon\u2019s influence and relevancy has plummeted in the last decade; he\u2019s pushing 70 and he wants to prove to himself (and his 11-year-old son) that \u2018he\u2019s still got it\u2019. Ah-ha, there it is.<\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0WHAT CRITICS ARE SAYING: SIMON COWELL: THE NEXT ACT <\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Metro\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘Simon Cowell\u2019s old-school Netflix talent show just doesn\u2019t work in 2025.’\u00a0<\/p>\n

Rating:<\/p>\n

[TWO STARS]\u00a0<\/p>\n

Telegraph<\/p>\n

‘Simon Cowell\u2019s comeback series is as flat as his hairdo.’\u00a0<\/p>\n

Rating:<\/p>\n

[ONE STAR]\u00a0<\/p>\n

Guardian<\/p>\n

Rating:<\/p>\n

[ONE STAR]\u00a0<\/p>\n

<!- – ad: https:\/\/mads.dailymail.co.uk\/v8\/us\/tvshowbiz\/none\/article\/other\/mpu_factbox.html?id=mpu_factbox_1 – -><\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

‘Simon Cowell: The Next Act is a vanity project \u2013 and a glossy, big budget one at that. It\u2019s as much about his next act as it is about finding the next big boyband. He always did have a way with words.’<\/p>\n

Greg Wheeler at The Review Geek<\/a>\u00a0said it’s ‘a dated vanity project dressed up as a revival’ and wrote: ‘Executively produced by Simon Cowell himself, the show unashamedly hammers you over the head with how success Cowell is and what a big deal he is (was).\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘The documentary side of things looks at Cowell\u2019s past, the artists he\u2019s worked with and how much the business means to him.\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘For obvious reasons, it sidesteps a lot of the allegations thrown his way from said artists.<\/p>\n

‘There\u2019s a dated quality to the show\u2019s setup, even without the usual reality-TV tricks. Sure, Cowell throws out his familiar platitudes now and then, but there are no dramatic pauses, applause cues, or engineered tension.\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘Removing them helps, but it doesn\u2019t modernise the bones of a creaking format.’<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Simon Cowell and his partner Lauren Silverman cuddled as they watched his new boyband December 10 take to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":776150,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[7757],"tags":[748,92,393,4884,226594,257,451,4099,1894,813,16,15],"class_list":["post-776149","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-london","tag-britain","tag-dailymail","tag-england","tag-great-britain","tag-lauren-silverman","tag-london","tag-netflix","tag-one-direction","tag-simon-cowell","tag-tvshowbiz","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116100579122300470","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/776149","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=776149"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/776149\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/776150"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=776149"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=776149"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=776149"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}