THE creator of ABC’s “American Inventor” blames Simon Cowell for his show not becoming a blockbuster – even though it’s been renewed.
“I was a little trepidatious going in,” Peter Jones tells TVguide.com. “It was a bit harder in my mind to make the show mega-successful because the producers got [fellow executive producer] Simon Cowell to front the show as if it was his – and I think that was probably a mistake for a couple of reasons.”
On the show, thousands of wannabe inventors competed against each other, with the finalists voted off the show by viewers until the winner was declared.
Jones says the public’s perception of Cowell, the tart-tongued “American Idol” judge, hurt the show.
“One, a lot of America wants to see Simon fail,” he says. “And two, it isn’t Simon’s show and it wasn’t even his idea. It was mine, and I don’t think it’s a good idea to try to kid America.”
The show’s winner, Janusz Liberkowski, 52, took home $1 million and the possibility that his invention of a new child car seat, named after his daughter who was killed in a car accident, could become a reality.