More and more information is coming from the Idol folks about the eye rolled 'round the world last night by Simon Cowell. Notably, Idol producer Ken Warwick said in a conference call with the press that Simon viewed the tape of the incident after the show and was equally horrified.

Like I said before, I think what Simon did is understandable because it happened in a moment.
Had Simon had a few extra seconds to fully understand what Chris had changed the topic TO....I think he would have let it go.

Simon Cowell is a good guy and a great player on TV. He reacted the same way many did in the privacy of their homes.... I'm still not buying the excuse about reacting to something Paula said.

by Keith Freshwater, Access production assistant

Tread lightly, reader, there may be spoilers ahead. Seeing as how I’m not blessed with Desmond-like future-seeing abilities, I can only do my best to speculate about what’s to come on “Lost.”

Executive producers Damon Lindelof & Carlton Cuse (Carlmon? Damton?) tease in (the official "Lost" podcast) this week that “something fairly momentous” will happen tonight and we should expect “good narrative momentum,” whatever that means. “Lost” has been experiencing great momentum as of late, especially when compared to the glacial start of Season Three. And according to EW, we’ll “bear witness to some sweaty sex on the beach, a shocking act of bloody violence, and a rousing debate between Hurley and Charlie about which superhero is faster: Superman or the Flash. The latter element captures the genius of 'Catch-22'." It seems the momentum is whipping into a frenzy.

But on to tonight:

What we do know: Desmond’s "Lost" love, Penny, will make an appearance. Tonight’s episode also marks the introduction of a new character whose identity has been kept under secure lock & key. However, we’ve been able to dig up a little info on who is portraying said character, none other than stunning “Las Vegas” alum and previous “Haunted Mansion” resident actress, Marsha Thomason, playing "Naomi."

(AP Photo, left: Marsha Thomason at a 2006 pre-Emmy party)

Last night on 'Idol', as soon as Simon Cowell was caught on camera rolling his eyes, I looked at my wife and said, "Its going to be a bad day for Simon tomorrow. He's next".

There is a poison in our society, and I can't decide if it's completely promulgated by the media or just 90%. There is an ongoing hunt for the next villain to splash across the front page and sell papers, boost ratings and further satiate peoples' lives with media.

Don Imus is breathing a little easier today.

But where the corporate entities that employed Imus bailed on him, and with enough grounds, you can bet that no matter how much the Simon "eye-roll" snowballs, Fox will back this guy to the hilt. He's the centerpiece of the biggest television sensation in history and the revenue of Idol is just too central to the corporate earnings report.

Today, an Idol producer released a statement. It reads in part:

"Simon was not reacting to Chris at that point. He had turned to speak to Paula and didn't actually hear Chris' final comments."

Photo Credit: "American Idol" FOX/Fremantle

Yet again another firestorm erupts surrounding "American Idol". This time, surprisingly, it's not about Sanjaya. Although, there was a bit of debate here over whether or not his number is finally up tonite. This morning it's a way more serious issue. All over the internet, message board users and bloggers are outraged that Simon Cowell rolled his eyes after contestant Chris Richardson made mention of the Virginia Tech massacre, "My heart and prayers go out to Virginia Tech. I have a lot of friends over there. Be strong."

We know he can be nasty when it comes to judging the contestants but could Simon Cowell really be so callous during such a time of national crisis? Simon came to his own defense on KIIS-FM with Ryan Seacrest this morning on his LA radio show. Simon claims he simply didn't hear Chris because he was still reeling from his comments about singing nasally on purpose, "The truth is that I had switched off at the point. I was talking to Paula and I was saying to Paula what does he mean he sang nasally on purpose. I didn't understand what he was saying. So, I hadnt even heard what he did. My eye rolling was what I was saying to Paula. I have never heard so much rubbish. But I did want to clear this one up because this is a very, very sensitive subject and we actually, the irony was is that we did want to try and set the right tone on the show and then something like this happens and it just starts fanning the flame and people got to understand that their are families involved. It's not right"

I feel like it was bound to happen at some point and last night it did. Heather Mills lost her balance and took a stumble. There was no drama. No whir of an ambulance. She just laughed it off and with a helping hand from her partner, Jonathan Roberts, stood right back up and went in front of the judges. Backstage we were all breaking it down that the fall should not have been counted off because the dance had already ended. However, when I watched it again this morning, it really was part of the dance so Carrie Ann Inaba made the right call to take a point off. She earned 21 points for the dance and after the show Heather was in great spirits with nothing but a chuckle about the fall, "At the time I was just like oh falling again. I'm always falling. I'm always slipping on leaves. I'm always falling over. People are always going 'oh' and I'm going it's fine I'm falling over, I'm up again."

The fall happened because Heather used the wrong leg, "I put my artificial leg on the floor and the other one on his chest and it was meant to be the other way around. So, I kind of went and slipped under. The falling over was like oh that didn't really hurt. I landed on the metal armor I'm wearing that's so heavy."

Well guys, the TV stuff is fun but I think I have a new career in my future... Marketing Guru or maybe Talent Manager. Now, I'm not a big phone person. I hate talking on it and I hate having to call people up and ask for things. It's why my career as a talent booker was short lived. When I'm passionate about something though, I put my phone phobias aside.

After, I hung up the phone from yesterday's conference call (where fortunately it’s mostly listening not talking!) with AMERICAN IDOL'S latest casualty, Haley Scarnato, I started thinking about headlines for my story. I needed something that had to do with legs. I couldn't get that famous commercial jingle out of my head, "Who wears short shorts? If you dare wear short shorts Nair for short shorts."

The Access Hollywood staff got very excited over last night's episode of "Lost" -- here's a bit of our back-and-forth e-mail conversation throughout today!

JB: Perhaps one of the top episodes ever!

Love her or hate her -- hard to argue that Juliet's not a great character.

What we learned:

- The Others can cure cancer
- but they can't cure tumors ???!!!
- Women who become pregnant on the island, can't give birth (which kind of tells us that the Others are trying to create a Utopian society and explains the kidnapping of children)
- Sun's in trouble
- Mikhail developed the portfolios on the 815 crash folks

Did anyone else notice Aaron appeared to say "Claire" towards the end -- weird … like the Hurley bird.

NF: Couldn't disagree more. The entire episode was spent building our sympathy for a girl that they then throw out completely with the stupid Shyamalan ending. All we really learned was things we've known for some time:

Jack makes terrible choices in woman
Never question Sayid's instincts
Ben has a fetish for proving to people what day it is
Claire has terrible luck
No one asked questions
And the producers love to screw w/ an overly loyal fan base

KF: Come on, NF, 'no one asked questions'? Sayid did exactly what you've been calling for since the beginning. "I want you to tell me everything..."

Major Good Spoilers After The Jump At End Of Post (You've Been Warned!)

As if being voted off last night wasn't bad enough, Haley Scarnato was bombarded with questions this morning about her legs and her choice to wear those short, shorts. Speaking in a conference call to reporters, it was clear the subject was not something Haley really wanted to discuss. Twice she mentioned that she just had to brush off those nasty Simon Cowell comments, "It's just legs. It is what it is. It's legs. I don't even know what to say about it. It's frustrating. You can't please everybody."

So, did she purposely wear those leg enhancing shorts since Simon made the comments the prior weeks about her having nice legs? Seems like the powers that be behind the scenes had a hand in making sure she did, "Well, you get so much feedback and they were kind of like keep it." Just as I suspected.

Ladies and Gentlemen please give it up for Sanjaya Malakar, who somehow has converted me into a fan. Now, before you tar and feather me, no I don't want the kid to go all the way and win this thing. I would however prefer him to stick around over the very boring Haley Scarnato, Phil Stacey and LaKisha Jones, which would firmly plant him in the Top 5. The kid is entertaining and I knew exactly what Randy Jackson meant when he said Sanjaya may be the smartest contestant they have ever had. The kid knows how to work it. He started out this shy kid who seemed out of his league and every week since then he has changed, morphed, gotten cockier and frankly more entertaining. Besides, last night, you have to admit vocally he wasn't half bad. Plus, it was pretty brazen of him to tackle a Latin song with Spanish lyrics. More importantly, I don't care about the singing. Now, I'm looking forward to seeing what new look he will try. First, it was the Pony Hawk, then the slicked backed greasy look and last night he looked like he had channeled a young Pablo Escobar. Although my boyfriend said he looked more like a kid who dressed up as a young Pablo Escobar for Halloween.

Turns out Sanjaya always had a flair for fashion according to his first cousin, Camila Recchi, "He's always been into his fashion and his stuff. I have never seen him go quite so crazy with his hairstyles before. Considering the situation you gotta go a little extreme."

Was there something in the water last night that made the judges cranky? It certainly seemed like it when right at the top of the show judge, Len Goodman gave the 9 celebrity dancers a major tongue lashing, "Last season they averaged 19 hours a week practice, this season 13 hours a week practice. That six hours is the difference between good dancing and great dancing. You've all got the talent to be great dancers. As far as I'm concerned looking at you are not putting in the hours. There is a sameness about you because you are not putting in the work. You are not getting in the practice and polishing your performances. I'm looking for that tonight and if I don't see it my marks will reflect it."

As they were being scolded some dancers smiled, some stood with their mouths open and others smirked and backstage everyone was affected. Heather Mills told me, "When we went backstage everybody was deafly silent, it was like a funeral where as normally we're like hey, having fun. We're the naughty school children."

Apolo Anton Ohno believes Len was out of line, "I think it's hard for anybody to judge another person’s work ethic. I'm an Olympic athlete. I'm a 2-time Olympic gold medalist. Look, if I don't make it on the next round, it's not because I didn't work hard enough."

Laila Ali told me she tried not let the comments affect her because she and her partner, Maksim Chmerkovskiy, were the first performers last night, "There's only so much I can tackle in and I know once my brain shuts off I'm not gonna sit there for 2 more hours just to be able to log that I was there for more time. We worked very hard so it's not like I'm gonna go, ‘oh my God we have to work harder’ because I don't think I can possibly work any harder than I've been working."