Heidi Klum is heading back to the AMERICA’S GOT TALENT judges’ table, filling in for Simon Cowell while he recovers from back surgery.
“The chair is ready and waiting for you, Heidi,” host Terry Crews announced on Wednesday’s episode, confirming Klum’s return for next week’s live rounds.
Klum, 53, will sit in for Cowell during a three-hour special airing Sept. 8, when AGT’s Season 21 quarterfinalists face off for a spot in the finals, according to Deadline, which first reported her return.
Cowell needs the time away to deal with lingering issues from his 2020 electric bike accident, which broke his back and required six hours of surgery to repair, Billboard reported. Sources told outlets covering the story that doctors haven’t identified any new major health emergency, and that this latest procedure is routine rather than a fresh crisis, but it’s still expected to keep him off the live stage for several weeks.
Klum isn’t the only familiar face stepping in while Cowell heals. Kenan Thompson has already sat in as a guest judge during his absence, and Billboard noted more guest judges are expected to rotate through the seat before Cowell returns.
Sofia Vergara, Howie Mandel and Mel B round out the rest of Season 21’s regular panel. Mel B took over Klum’s old seat when this season began, according to TV Insider, after Klum spent more than a decade at the table.
Related: Why Simon Cowell Won’t Be on AMERICA’S GOT TALENT
Klum first joined AGT in 2013 and judged through 2018, then returned in 2020 for another run that lasted through 2024, ComingSoon reported. She’s also appeared on the franchise’s spinoffs, AMERICA’S GOT TALENT: FANTASY LEAGUE, ALL-STARS and THE CHAMPIONS, so the judges’ table this month will look less like a substitution and more like a homecoming.
AGT has built two decades of its live-show format on exactly this kind of familiarity, asking singers, dancers, magicians and the occasional daredevil to win over both a studio audience and four judges who buzz them out the moment a performance stops working. Viewers tend to stick around for the judges’ chemistry as much as the acts themselves, which is part of why NBC keeps reaching for names its audience already trusts whenever a chair opens up.
Movieguide® has followed the AGT judges’ table before, from spotlighting the judges’ favorite acts to celebrating winners like Richard Goodall, who praised his wife for her support after his win.
It’s a small thing, in an industry built on constant reinvention, that NBC didn’t reach for a stranger to fill Cowell’s chair. They called someone who already knows the show, the format and the family sitting next to her on camera. Watching a colleague step aside so someone else can heal, and watching that seat get filled with care rather than convenience, isn’t a groundbreaking story. It’s just a decent one, and decent stories are worth noticing.
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