Rapper Nicki Minaj and country singer Keith Urban will join "American Idol" as judges, Fox network announced Sunday, part of an effort to reboot the aging but still popular singing competition.
that veteran judge Randy Jackson would return. The additions follows news earlier in the summer that Jennifer Lopez and Steven Tyler, two of last season's judges, would be departing.
Fox and executives from parent company News Corp. have talked for months about rejiggering the show, whose ratings have eroded in the past couple of years, amid the arrival of competitors like NBC's "The Voice" and Fox's "X Factor." While it continues to trounce pretty much everything else on air, with the exception of NBC's "Sunday Night Football," its audience during last season had shrunk to nearly half of the 31 million viewers who had watched during its heyday in 2006.
"American Idol" is critical to Fox's efforts to keep its status as No. 1 among the key 18 to 49 audience demographic. News Corp. also owns The Wall Street Journal.
The addition of Ms. Minaj could add an element of unpredictability to draw younger viewers. Trinidadian-born Ms. Minaj, known for her offbeat wigs, rose up from the underground mix-tape scene to sell chart-topping albums, including her latest, "Pink Friday: Roman Reloaded."
Earlier in the summer, Fox Entertainment head Kevin Reilly suggested that dramatic host changes like these would become a part of Idol's future.
"The audience wants to keep discovering something new on the bench," he said in July, "so we're going to keep playing with it."