The whole world was rightfully shocked when powerhouse singer Jennifer Hudson was eliminated from American Idol season three in 2004. After a series of stellar performances, Hudson was placed in the bottom three with fellow contestants LaToya London and eventual winner Fantasia Barrino in week six after performing Barry Manilow’s “Weekend in New England.” While Elton John called the votes “incredibly racist,” judge Simon Cowell recently blamed the song choice during an appearance on Hudson’s new daytime talk show The Jennifer Hudson Show.
Nearly two decades later, Jennifer Hudson—one of Glamour‘s 2022 Women of the Year—opened up about the experience, telling Glamour that while she didn’t think she was going to win, she was surprised to be going home so soon given the momentum she’d been building and consistently receiving so many votes. Still, she knew her career was far from over.
“I was like, okay, this is the end of the road here, but it doesn’t mean it’s the end because I still have my gift and what I learned from my [Idol] experience,” she said in her Women of the Year profile. “What can I take from this to propel forward?”
The next move, of course, was to win an Academy Award. Just a few months after she left Idol, Jennifer Hudson was approached to audition for the role of Effie White in Dreamgirls. And with that role, starring alongside the like of Beyoncé and Jamie Foxx, the singer checked the “Oscar” box on her way to making EGOT history.
By 2022 she had cemented her spot as the 17th performer to win an Emmy (for producing the series Baba Yaga), a Grammy (she has two), a Tony (for producing A Strange Loop) and, of course, an Oscar, joining the ranks of EGOT Hollywood icons like Audrey Hepburn and Rita Moreno. And to be clear, that’s a more exclusive club than the winners of American Idol (there are 19 and counting). Just saying.
