Mariah Carey joins American Idol

Update

It’s been reported that FOX is paying Mariah $18million for one year making her the highest paid reality TV judge.

Original story

Fox Entertainment President Kevin Reilly announced on Monday that Mariah Carey will be joining “American Idol” as a judge next season, filling the chair that was left vacant by Jennifer Lopez.

During a phone interview with TV critics, Reilly said he was able to land the “biggest recording artist”, bigger than any of the other judges on the other singing competition shows.

Before he introduced Mariah to the critics on speaker phone he said “It’s an artist many of these contestants have tried to emulate.”  He then put Mariah on speaker phone and she said: “I am so excited to be joining Idol.  First of all, I wanted to be there today and I wish I could have been there to tell you, but I think you know this all kind of just happened real quickly, so I can’t wait to get started in a couple months.”

For the record, her first season on Idol, Jennifer made $12million and she earned $15million for her second season.

There is a rumor that Jennifer wanted a raise to return to the reality show but because ratings fell her second season Fox said ‘no’ to the raise.

No word on how much Mariah will be making, but her husband, Nick Cannon, recently said in an interview that Idol could not afford his wife.