Simon Cowell Reveals His Eight-Year-Old Son Helped Him Almost Quit Smoking

“X Factor” creator and music producer Simon Cowell recently talked about his son, Eric, and how the eight-year-old almost cured him of his smoking habits. The record executive got engaged to entrepreneur/socialite Lauren Silverman after the duo started seeing each other in 2013.

Cowell recently spoke about his eight-year-old and how serious he was in his quest to stop the producer from smoking. Sinitta, Cowell’s ex, previously called Eric the “little cigarette police.”

The tv-personality is gearing up to launch a talent discovery program on TikTok called “Stemdrop.” According to the producer, it will allow millions worldwide access to a brand new song and make their versions of it.

Read on to learn more.

One Direction creator Cowell joined Extra in a recent interview to talk about his new talent discovery program in collaboration with TikTok, “StemDrop – A Song for the World.” The project will be launched later this month.

During the interview, the producer also shed light on his smoking habits, and he started cutting back on it under the watchful eye of his son, Eric. Powell revealed that he had to sneak around the house to have his “four puffs” while his son followed him.

He said, “He is really strict. If he catches me, it’s like being back in school. He’s the teacher. I have to sneak behind the hedges, and I’m having my four puffs, and I can see him following me around, but I said to him the other day, ‘Thanks to you, I’ve nearly quit.’”

While talking to The Sun in a previous interview, Cowell’s ex-girlfriend Sinitta revealed that the eight-year-old followed his father around and only allowed him “one puff” of his cigarette. “He [Eric] follows him around and only allows Simon to have one puff of a cigarette,” she said. “He always says ‘how many puffs, how many puffs.’ Eric is like a little cigarette police and keeps him on his toes,”

Sinitta, Eric’s godmother, noted that Cowell not only smokes but the producer has been caught vaping a number of times. The “Cross My Broken Hearts” artist said the talent show judge did not think of himself as addicted and claimed he could put an end to it when he wanted to.

“He doesn’t see himself as addicted because he says he can cut down whenever he wants,” she said. “He probably smokes one cigarette, maybe two a day. But what he does is light one cigarette and has one puff and puts it out – he does that multiple times during the day.”

During his interview with Extra, Cowell revealed that he would partner with Max Martin, the Grammy-winning songwriter behind Britney Spears’ “Baby One More Time.” He explained that the new project would have people worldwide come together to record their unique versions of a brand-new song.

The producer said, “Imagine if you saw some of the biggest songwriters in the world wrote a brand-new song, and instead of giving it to a well-known artist, you gave it to the world to record… We are dropping it on TikTok for basically the world to record their version of the song.”

Cowell revealed that the name of the first song is “Red Light” and that he initially felt nervous because he wasn’t sure he would like the track despite everything that was already put in place, but he “really loved it.”

Further on, the X Factor creator said that the entire purpose of the “Stemdrop” was to find new talents. Cowell continued, “The hardest thing if you’re not writing your own material is how do you get that first rung up the ladder, and I think what this might be is part of the missing link.”

The producer also revealed that he thought the essential thing in a musician’s career was “a hit song.” He noted the boy band he formed, One Direction, whose “What Makes You Beautiful” stood out to him immediately after he heard it.

Cowell also shared that he immediately recognized Martin’s “Baby One More Time” as a hit and really wanted it for his then-boyband Five (5ive). The songwriter, Martin, revealed that he had already promised it to Spears and held fast to his word despite the producer’s sugared promises.