Los Angeles - In 2001, Simon Cowell figured a singing contest snapped up by British TV would be an easy sell in America. Instead, network responses ranged from lukewarm to hostile.
"I was thrown out in one pitch meeting. After 30 seconds, the guy told me to get out," recalled Cowell, making the rounds with entertainment mogul Simon Fuller.
"The main thing we were being told was music doesn't work on TV in prime-time. We tried to explain that there's lot more than music on the show."
So much for Hollywood acumen: The international Idol empire founded by Fuller has made a hit TV show seem an obvious, even puny ambition as Idolmania has swept across the pop culture realm.
The talent contest has "created this whole zeitgeist, and it's really about Americans and participating in creating a celebrity of their own," said media analyst Shari Ann Brill of Carat USA.
Instant careers
Kelly Clarkson, Carrie Underwood and Jennifer Hudson are among the singers rewarded with instant careers in music, movies and in theatre.
A chorus of enterprises has gotten a dusting of Idol magic as well, from Dreyer's ice cream (Cookies N Dreamz among the novelty flavours) to a Disney World attraction to the Karaoke Revolution Presents American Idol video game.
A deal with iTunes for exclusive show video and song downloads last season coincided with Apple's emergence as the leading music retailer in the US.
There's even altruistic value in the franchise: The charity initiative Idol Gives Back raised $64m in 2008 for groups including Children's Health Fund and Malaria No More.
Fuller, who started it all with Britain's Pop Idol and carried the concept to the United States and more than 35 TV markets worldwide, told The Times of London that "pure, simple television is not that interesting for me; what's far more interesting is trying to create a cult effect".
It's been a lucrative exercise for Fuller and others. His 19 Entertainment, a division of CKX Inc, reported an operating profit of $92.5m, a 37% increase over 2008's $67.4m.
Fuller's net worth in 2008 reportedly approached $1bn.
Money machine
FremantleMedia, which teams with 19 Entertainment in producing the US version, exporting the format and licensing, is another winner. FremantleMedia North America CEO Cecile Frot-Coutaz is an executive producer of American Idol.
For Fox, which gave American Idol a modest summertime tryout in 2002 at the urging of Rupert Murdoch, whose News Corp owns the network, the show is a money machine.
A 30-second commercial on Idol costs around $500 000 and rises to more than $600 000 for the finale, said Ray Dundas, an analyst for ad-buying firm Initiative.
By comparison, he said, other top 10 shows, such as Grey's Anatomy, get closer to $240 000 per half-minute ad.
The difference reflects both the size of the Idol audience and the fact that it can deliver the elusive young adult viewers preferred by advertisers, Dundas said.
American Idol, in short, big-foots broadcasting.
It has dominated as the most-watched series since its third year, a pattern that's holding true this season even as ratings dip in an overall TV slump.
Trendsetter
Two-hour American Idol episodes on Tuesday have averaged 58% more viewers than the closest competition.
"I don't believe there will ever be another show like this. It's the last of its breed as the consumer pool is increasingly splintered by broadcast, cable, DVRs and the internet," said Mike Darnell, Fox's president of alternative entertainment.
As a trendsetter, Idol has served as blueprint for a generation of shows in which contestants - whether singing, dancing, skating, playing the fiddle or swallowing fire - are vetted by a triad that includes one wasp-tongued TV judge, preferably with a foreign accent.
Len Goodman of Dancing with the Stars and Nigel Lythgoe of So You Think You Can Dance (and a former Idol producer) are part of the elite group.
Idol singers remain irresistible gossip fodder, with unknowns such as this year's drama queen Tatiana Del Toro heaped with water-cooler and online attention, at least for the moment.
Some Idol alumni have earned the ultimate - if unwelcome - proof of fame: They've become newsmakers, whether by dint of tragedy (Hudson, who lost family members to murder) or sexual orientation (Clay Aiken came out as gay when he announced the birth of his son).
Whatever the headlines, the Idol brand itself remains coveted by major companies.
Multiple Grammy winners
Underwood has sold 10 million record albums; Clarkson is just shy of that with sales of 9.5 million.
And both are multiple Grammy winners and critical favourites - not bad for a talent show that critics say is guilty of cheesy exploitation of the overtly untalented.
"American Idol for the record industry is one of the few bright spots over the last seven, eight years. No one else has figured out the magic formula for selling records, and American Idol has one," said Steve Knopper, author of Appetite for Self-Destruction: The Spectacular Crash of the Record Industry in the Digital Age.
"It's old-fashioned when you think of it: TV helps you sell records," Knopper said, a lesson as old as the 1960s US introduction of the Beatles on The Ed Sullivan Show.
Hudson's album sales are under one million, but she's doing okay: She won an Academy Award for Dreamgirls.
"How long did American Bandstand last - 30 years, 40 years?" Knopper said. "I think Idol is built in that universal way. It's a talent show. It's not reinventing the wheel."
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