Back in 2012, up-and-coming musician Lucy Spraggan was 20 years old and experienced quite the life-changing moment via an opportunity to audition for one of the most influential unscripted series of the past 25 years: The X Factor. As created by Simon Cowell, the precedessor to American Idol was as popular as ever, with the wildly successful group One Direction turning their 2010 third-place spot into international fame and fortune. Despite crushing it during the auditions and early weeks of competition, Spraggan bowed out of the season after three weeks of live performances, with an unidentified illness as the reasoning. Now, the singer-songwriter has opened up and revealed the actual reason for her exit is that she was raped after a night of show-sponsored celebrating.
After eleven years of holding onto that trauma and the many other emotions tethered to such a damaging experience, Lucy Spraggan is now at a place both personally and professionally where she feels comfortable sharing her story with fans and the public at large. Her entire journey is laid out in her memoir Process (set for release on July 20), from the initial incident to the years of drinking, drugs and partying that served as the aftermath. She spoke at length with The Guardian about that harrowing time in her life, and while she feels that the X Factor producers at the time failed at providing enough support after the fact, she gave credit to Simon Cowell for being an authentic pillar of consolation and encouragement.
Though he wasn’t part of the judge’s table during Spraggan’s season, as he was busy helping turn America’s Got Talent into a ratings winner here in the U.S., Cowell reportedly reached out to Spraggan through a rep in 2021 after she wrote letters to The X Factor’s corporate powers that be, including ITV, Syco and Fremantle, seeking more information about that time. Cowell shared the following statement about the matter:
[What happened] was horrific and heartbreaking. When I was given the opportunity to speak to Lucy, I was able to personally tell her how sorry I was about everything she has been through. Although we met under tragic circumstances, a genuine friendship and a mutual respect has developed between us. Lucy is one of the most authentic, talented and brave people I have ever met. I have always supported her wish to tell her story as well as her efforts to bring about positive change.
Speaking to that, Cowell and Spraggan are said to have grown closer in the two years or so since they first connected, to the point where her upcoming seventh album, Balance, was revealed to be the first release under the musician's deal with Cowell's record label Syco Music.
Lucy Spraggan admitted that she was initially hesitant to get on the phone with the X Factor creator, especially after responses from ITV and others left her feeling as if she wasn't ever going to get a proper apology from anyone on the industry side. However, she claimed it was exactly what was needed at the time, saying:
I thought, ‘Do I want to get battered any more?’ I went on the call thinking I’d give him a piece of my fucking mind. But instead of breaking my heart, he put it back together. It sounds weird, and it was weird. I didn’t know that that was what I needed.
During their initial talk, Spraggan said that Cowell shared that he was "truly, truly sorry" that he wasn't there for her in a proper capacity, and that he'd thought about her many times over the years, regretting that he hadn't approached her before. Considering the timing of it all, the singer copped to being slightly suspcious about how genuine the mega-producer's offer to work together was, but says she was convinced that he was trying to do the right thing by her, despite likely being warned against it by others. In her words:
At first I was thinking, Is this machiavellian? Are you playing a game? And I have no idea whether that was happening. But the amount of trauma that I’ve gone through makes me a hypervigilant reader of people’s micro-expressions, the way they talk, their consistency. His behaviour towards me is authentic. Despite what quite a lot of people seem to think, he’s a human being. And I reckon every legal adviser told him, ‘Don’t go near that girl.’ The ‘sorry’ that Simon chose to give me closed one of the most uncomfortable chapters of my life.
During the fourth week of X Factor live shows back in 2012, Spraggan went out to celebrate the 25th birthday of fellow LGBTQ+ contestant Rylan Clark (with whom she'd recently been booted from the show's go-to hotel and moved to a less secure hotel nearby). At some point, she passed out and was brought back to the new hotel by someone from production, with a porter stepping in to help bring her back to her room. It's alleged that the porter left the lock unlatched, which Clark himself discovered when he stopped by the room to check on Spraggan. Upon leaving, he flipped the latch back inside and closed the door properly.
After this, the porter used one of the hotel's keycards to gain access to Spraggan's room, where he is said to have raped her. The keycard is essentially how justice was able to be served, as the hotel employee was quickly arrested, and was later convcted of rape and sentenced to ten years in prison. But while that was a somewhat straightforward process, it was anything but for the musician in the days, months, and years that followed. She spent more than ten years with that burden weighing heavily, and it started having widespread negative ramifictions. After substance abuse and other questionable actions caused her to get dropped from her label, she attempted suicide in 2014.
Since that time, Lucy Spraggan has thought many times about going public with her story, particularly after the #MeToo movement gained ground, and after the former X Factor presenter Caroline Flack took her own life in 2020. Part of the fear of speaking out is that she worried she might forever be thought of only in the context of experiencing her reality TV tragedy, and told The Guardian that the working title for her memoir was Are You That Girl? But she built up the confidence to share her story with fans after proving to herself just how successful she's been as an artist. And one that didn't even need the accolades of winning X Factor to make it all happen.
Speaking of the competition series, Simon Cowell has talked in recent years about resurrecting it from its end in 2018, and the current success that Harry Styles is enjoying is another reminder of what reality TV awareness can bring to an artist (even despite auditions that don't win crowds over). Cowell has also talked about bringing Britney Spears into the fold, although he may want to have Spraggan on a shortlist of potential returnees as well.
Here's hoping Spraggan experiences a ton of happiness, validation and support with the impending releases of both her new album Balance and her autobiography Process.
