Jennifer Lopez Recalls Joining ‘American Idol’ & Defying Team Who Feared She Would Be “Reduced To Just A Reality Star”

Jennifer Lopez might not have been on American Idol had she not followed her instincts.

Lopez joined the singing competition show in Season 10 (2011) as a judge alongside Steven Tyler and Randy Jackson. However, in a new interview, the singer and actress revealed that her team had advised her against doing reality TV.

“I’ll do things that could be risky because I believe that they’re going to turn out okay,” Lopez told Nikki Glaser for Interview magazine. “I’d done all these big movies and made these albums and now they’re asking me to do reality TV.”

She continued, I’ve had kids and I haven’t worked for a couple of years. American Idol was a big show at the time. It really comes down to, what do I think I can bring to something? When all of my advisors were like, ‘Don’t do this, you’re going to be reduced to just a reality star.'”

Lopez said that doing reality TV at the time “was looked down upon,” recalling that her team advised her against doing it for fear of jeopardizing her movie career.

“And I was just like, ‘No. I don’t think that’s what’s going to happen. I think I have something to contribute.’ I love music and I love mentoring people, and I wanted to share the things that I knew about the business,” she said. “So it became more about, ‘What do I think I can do with this?’ When I’m choosing things, even if they seem like not the best idea to everybody else, if I feel it in my gut that it’s the right thing to do, nobody can talk me out of it.”

Lopez noted that she had a similar conversation when approached to do a Las Vegas residency with her team, telling her, “That’s where entertainers go to die.” The star defied them again, adding, “And it launched me into a whole new part of my life.”

Lopez returned to American Idol Season 11, and the whole panel was revamped for Season 12. She would come back for Season 13 alongside Harry Conick Jr. and Keith Urban. Lopez spent three more seasons on the judge’s panel before Fox canceled it after Season 15 in 2016.

Following her time on American Idol, Lopez returned to reality TV to judge the dancing competition World of Dance.