X Factor is a Franco-Belgian television music talent show to find new singing talent after public auditions, intermediate tests, and live shows. The first season was broadcast on Mondays, from September to December 2009, on W9 (France) and RTL-TVI (Belgium).
The second and final season was broadcast on Tuesdays, from March to June 2011, on M6 and RTL-TVI.
Series overview Contestant in "Alain Lanty" (over the age of 25) Contestant in "Julie Zenatti" (ages 16 to 24) Contestant in "Marc Cerrone" (groups) Contestant in "Henri Padovani" (groups) Contestant in "Oliver Schultheis" (girls) Contestant in "Christophe Willem" (over the age of 25) Contestant in "Véronic DiCaire" (boys)
Season Start Finish Winner Runner-Up Winning Mentor Presenter Main judges Guest judges 1 2 3 4 1 28 September 2009 28 December 2009 Sébastien Agius Marie Alain Lanty Alexandre Devoise Alain Lanty Julie Zenatti Marc Cerrone rowspan="1" rowspan="3" 2 15 March 2011 28 June 2011 Matthew Raymond-Barker Marina d'Amico Véronic DiCaire Sandrine Corman Olivier Schultheis Christophe Willem Véronic Dicaire Henry Padovani
Judges' categories and their contestants
In each season, each judge is allocated a category to mentor and chooses three acts to progress to the live shows. This table shows, for each season, which category each judge was allocated and which acts he or she put through to the live shows.
Key: – Winning judge/category. Winners are in bold, eliminated contestants in small font.
Season Alain Lanty Marc Cerrone Julie Zenatti style="width:13%;" rowspan="2" 1Over 25'sSébastien AnnieCécile GroupsBasilicCharacter SoulGauthier Dymon & Flo 16-24'sMarieCyrielleGuillaume Season Olivier Schultheis Christophe Willem Véronic Dicaire Henry Padovani 2 GirlsMarina D'AmicoSarah ManesseBérénice Schleret Over 25'sMaryvette LairVincent LéotyCécile CoudercBoysMatthew Raymond-BarkerFlorian GiustinianiRaphaël Herrerias Groups2nde NatureOmégaTwem
Season 1 (2009) The first season of the show aired from September to December 2009 and the winner was 26-year-old Sébastien Agius from the "Over 25" category. The judges were Alain Lanty, Julie Zenatti and Marc Cerrone.
Contestants The top 9 acts were confirmed as follows:
Key: – Winner – Runner up
Category (mentor) Acts Over 25 (Lanty) Annie Cécile Sébastien Groups (Cerrone) Basilic Character Soul Gauthier Dymon & Flo 16-24s (Zenatti) Cyrielle Guillaume Marie
Results summary
Color key: –Contestant in the category 16-24 –Contestant in the category over 25 –Contestant in the category groups –Contestant was in the bottom two and had to sing again in the final showdown –Contestant received the fewest public votes and was immediately eliminated (no final showdown)
Week 1 Week 2 Week 3 Week 4 Week 5 Week 6 Week 7 Week 8 SEMIFINAL FINAL Sébastien Safe Safe Safe Safe SafeSafeSafe Winner MarieSafe Safe Safe SafeSafe Bottomtwo Safe Runner up BasilicSafe Safe Safe Safe Bottomtwo Safe 3rd Eliminated(Week 7) Cyrielle BottomtwoSafe Bottomtwo BottomtwoSafe Bottomtwo Eliminated(Week 6) GuillaumeSafe Safe Safe Safe Bottomtwo Eliminated(Week 5) AnnieSafe Safe Safe Bottomtwo Eliminated(Week 4) Character SoulSafe Bottomtwo Bottomtwo Eliminated(Week 3) Gauthier Dymon & FloSafe Bottomtwo Eliminated(Week 2) Cécile Bottomtwo Eliminated(Week 1) Bottom two Cyrielle,Cécile Character Soul,Gauthier Dymon & Flo Cyrielle,Character Soul Cyrielle,Annie Basilic,Guillaume Marie,Cyrielle No judges' vote or final showdown: public votes alone decide who is eliminated and who ultimately wins Zenatti's vote to eliminateCécile Gauthier Dymon & Flo Character Soul Annie Basilic Cyrielle Cerrone's vote to eliminateCécile Gauthier Dymon & Flo Cyrielle Annie Guillaume Marie Lanty's vote to eliminateCyrielle Character Soul Character Soul Cyrielle Guillaume Cyrielle Eliminated Cécile2 of 3 votes Gauthier Dymon & Flo2 of 3 votes Character Soul2 of 3 votes Annie2 of 3 votes Guillaume2 of 3 votes Cyrielle2 of 3 votes Basilic Marie48% to win Sébastien52% to win
Ratings Show Date Viewers Share SourceAuditions 1 28 September 20:35-22:30 589,000 2.3 % Audiences : Débuts très décevants pour X Factor sur W9Auditions 2 5 October 20:35-22:30 800,000 2.9% Audience X Factor sur W9 Auditions 3 12 October 20:35-22:30 691,000 2.6% Audiences prime : TF1 en tête / Beau score pour France 2Boot Camp 19 October 20:35-22:30 812,000 3.3% Audiences : X Factor remonteJudge's Houses 1 26 October 20:35-22:30 640,000 2.5% X Factor déchante face à la concurrenceJudge's Houses 2 2 November 20:35-22:30 619,000 2.3% Joséphine reste l'ange gardien de TF1 en prime-timeLive Show / Results 1 9 November 20:35-22:30 863,000 3.5% TF1 en tête en prime, mais flop pour France 3Live Show / Results 2 16 November 20:35-22:30 726,000 3.0% Audience prime: TF1 leader/Bon score pour France 2Live Show / Results 3 23 November 20:35-22:30 670,000 2.6% TF1 leader en prime / Mireille Dumas sous la barre des 10%Live Show / Results 4 30 November 20:35-22:30 928,000 3.7 % X Factor en live : Regardez l'hommage à Michael Jackson, le jury de mauvaise humeur, le départ d'Annie et... Record d'audience ! (réactualisé)Live Show / Results 5 7 December 20:35-22:30 715,000 3.4% Audiences prime: TF1 leader/Beau score pour France 2Live Show / Results 6 14 December 20:35-22:30 800,000 3.3% Audiences prime: France 2 en tête/Flop pour M6Semifinal / Results 7 21 December 20:35-22:30 613,000 2.3% TF1 battue par France 2 en prime-time hier soirFinal / Results 8 28 December 20:35-22:30 900,000 3.6% Audiences en prime-time: TF1 en tête / Flop pour M6
Season 2 (2011) Based on a generally good public reception, and after some speculations, X Factor came back for a second season in March 2011 on M6 (mother TV channel of W9), in place of Nouvelle Star, the French Pop Idol, programmed on M6 since 7 years after audience figures deteriorated for StarNouvelle Star laisse bien sa place à X Factor sur M6 !
Frédéric de Vincelles, general manager of W9, declared that even though all targeted goals were not attained in season 1, the program had still realised some respectable audience figures for the chain, making it the biggest grossing program for the network in 2009.
Differences with first season First season was aired on a small TV channel with limited means. This is not the case with the second season, as the program tries to emulate the successful British edition. For this second season, M6 assigned 4 artists to be part of the jury: Christophe Willem, Véronic Dicaire, Olivier Schultheis and Henry Padovani. All judges are new and replace the old set of three judges Marc Cerrone, Alain Lanty and Julie Zenatti. Auditions were held in major French theatres, in public. The bootcamp lasted for days and included 3 events: vocal duels, choreography and solos on orchestra-band. Two to three French or international popstars are invited each week during liveshows . During shows, a second program, named "F@n Factor: Le Prime", is broadcast on the internet to show the backstage and see preparation of candidates and their reactions after singing. So, there isn't an after-show as Xtra Factor. Every day, a short program, named "F@n Factor: Le Mag", is broadcast on the internet to show repetitions of candidates with their coaches, and their daily activities.
Judges and hosts
For this second season, judges of the first season are not renewed. Also, for the first time, there are four judges (so four categories in competition) : Christophe Willem (27 years old) – French singer and songwriter. He sang in a gospel choir and won the fourth edition of Nouvelle Star (French version of Pop Idol) in 2006. He sold over 2 million albums and was nominated several times in NRJ Music Awards and Victoires de la Musique. Olivier Schultheis (45 years old) – French conductor, musician and songwriter. He discovered Christophe Maé and composed for Hélène Ségara, Thierry Amiel, Christophe Willem and for musicals (Le Roi Soleil, Mozart l'opéra rock...) and wrote soundtracks for films. He was also a producer of Nouvelle Star (French version of Pop Idol). Véronic DiCaire (34 years old) - Franco-Ontarian singer and imitator. She was discovered by Céline Dion and René Angélil and was renowned for her imitations of many voices including Céline Dion, Tina Turner, Lynda Lemay, Lara Fabian, Isabelle Boulay, Christina Aguilera, Cyndi Lauper, Vanessa Paradis and others. She released two albums (with her real performing voice) in 2002 and 2005. Henry Padovani (58 years old) – Corsican songwriter, guitarist and manager. He is the founding member of The Police with Stewart Copeland but Sting fired him in favour of Andy Summers. He was the director of IRS Records, where he promoted many groups such as R.E.M., The Fleshtones, The Cramps, and The Bangles. He was also the manager of Zucchero and I Muvrini.
To present the show, M6 selected Sandrine Corman for the liveshows and early stages and Jérôme Anthony for F@n Factor and early stages.
Chronology of the early stages
Preselections: 2 November 2010 in Nice, Lyon and Strasbourg 4 November 2010 in Marseille, Lille and Clermont-Ferrand 6 November 2010 in Montpellier, Rennes and Brussels (Belgium) 8 November 2010 in Toulouse 9–10 November 2010 in Paris Auditions:
Audition city Dates Venue Lille 2–3 December 2010 Lille Grand Palais(1,500 seats) Lyon 9 December 2010 Cité-Centre de Congrès de Lyon(3,000 seats) Montpellier 13–14 December 2010 Zénith Sud(3,200 seats) Paris 3-4-5–6 January 2011 Studio 204 - Plaine Saint-Denis(600 seats)
'Bootcamp' : 25-26-27–28 January 2011 in Palais des Sports (Paris).
Judges' Houses Top 24 acts were chosen with six in each of the four category. The judges added a 25th contestant in the Groups category making the contestants for the Groups seven instead of six. The newly created group was named "Seconde Nature" and included 5 candidates who had applied for the "Boys" category but had failed to qualify individually to the Top 24, but were deemed talented enough to be given a second chance by performing as part of a band in the Groups category.
+Summary of Judges' Houses Judge Category Location Assistants Acts eliminated DiCaire Boys Quebec Roch Voisine . Sofiane Boncoeur, Slimane Nebchi, Michael Picquerey Willem Over 25s London Zaho Lilou Bourial, Christophe Gilard, Barry Johnson Schultheis Girls Morocco Alain Chamfort Ana Dupont, Charlène Gervais, Audrey Passani Padovani Groups French Perigord Sharleen Spiteri Arcanes, New Style Project, Presteej, Swalk
Contestants
Key: – Winner – Runner-Up
Category (mentor) Acts Over 25s (Willem) Cécile Couderc Maryvette Lair Vincent Léoty Groups (Padovani) Oméga 2nde Nature Twem Girls (Schultheis)Marina D'Amico Sarah Manesse Bérénice Schleret Boys (DiCaire) Florian Giustiniani Raphaël HerreriasMatthew Raymond-Barker
Results summary Colour key: –Contestant in the category boys –Contestant in the category girls –Contestant in the category over 25 –Contestant in the category groups –Contestant was in the bottom two and had to sing again in the final showdown –Contestant received the fewest public votes and was immediately eliminated (no final showdown)