55 Quotes by Nigel Lythgoe

Hip-hop is a way of life. It isn't a genre in truth in 'American Idol.'

I put the heart attack down to 66 cigarettes a day.

I think British audiences are accustomed to the 'boo' factor and pantomimes.

I trained in every form of dance - started as a tap dancer when I was a kid, then contemporary, ballet, ballroom, everything. Russian, Swedish.

There's no question 'Amazing Race' is a beautifully produced show.

We've had nothing but support from everybody in the dance world for a National Dance Day.

I nearly died with the peritonitis, but not the heart attack. The heart attack was like bad indigestion and two weeks later I was back in shouting at people. I was shouting at people during the heart attack. I had it for three days without realising what it was.

So many people report to be contemporary dancers, and they're not. They are sort of jazz dancers that feel like they're throwing a bit of classical in there. I mean, a true contemporary dancer has got ballet as their base and classical ballet, and that is their base. And then they choose to extemporize on that and go into a contemporary world.

We put too much on contemporary dancers. A lot of them cannot change styles; a lot of them can't do anything else other than run around the stage reaching and stretching in anguish to somebody off camera that I never understand who it is. But it's the teenage angst they have to live with.