America’s Next Top Model has been thrown back into the spotlight, and former stars of the show are speaking out.
Janice Dickinson, who viewers can agree was quite a polarising member of the cast, has spoken out about her time on the show in the new E! Series Dirty Rotten Scandals.
The 71-year-old former model claimed Tyra Banks was pushing her to be “harsher” during judging of the girls’ photos from their shoots.
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“The producers on America’s Next Top Model, especially Tyra, were begging me to be harsher and cruel, like Simon Cowell was on American Idol,” Dickinson claimed during a recent episode of the series.
At the time, Cowell was a judge on American Idol and his snarky and at times brutal responses were ratings gold for the series.
The process of ANTM was a similar format to Idol, with the girls competing to win a modelling contract, rather than a record deal – thus the drive to have a similar appeal for success in ratings.
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Elsewhere in the episode, Dickinson opened up about Banks’ attitude towards the contestants
She claimed the supermodel would flip from being supportive to antagonistic at different points throughout the show, and alleged it was due to her seeing them as competition.
“Tyra didn’t want any competition,” Dickinson claimed.
She also believes Banks “would go harder on the Black girls on the show, because it’s about competitiveness and jealousy and her being older than these young models.”
Despite Banks having a supportive ‘big sister’ role throughout moments of the show’s 24 seasons, which ran between 2003 and 2018, Dickinson alleged this wasn’t the case.
“She was always trying to be this tough ‘team mom’ to the girls, but she just did not build up enough confidence in the girls,” she said.
“They left the show completely depressed and depleted while she got so effing rich.”
nine.com.au has reached out to Banks for comment on the claims made by Dickinson.
Dickinson was replaced on the judging panel by former model Twiggy in 2005, but she continued to appear as a guest judge through 2006.
She went on to star in VH1’s The Surreal Life and landed her own show, The Janice Dickinson Modelling Agency, which ran from 2006 to 2008.
Dickinson is one of many who are now speaking out about the modelling competition show, with former contestants and winners airing their issues in the Dirty Rotten Scandals: America’s Next Top Model series.
Banks was not interviewed for the E! series.
Netflix has also released a three-part documentary series, Reality Check: Inside America’s Next Top Model, which explores the history of the show, including interviews with Banks.
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