Liam Payne’s death at the age of 31 sent shockwaves through the music world and beyond. The singer spent more than half his life in the public eye after auditioning for “The X-Factor” as a teenager.
Originally appeared on E! Online
Nicole Scherzinger was always in Liam Payne's corner.
In fact, Scherzinger was texting with the late One Direction alum on the day that he died, as revealed by Andrew Lloyd Webber, who composed the music for the Broadway musical Sunset Blvd., which stars the Pussycat Dolls alum.
"I suppose something that hasn’t been said, and I suppose I could say, is that of course she mentored Liam, from One Direction," Webber said in a Billboard interview published Oct. 24. "On the Wednesday when he died, she was still texting him that day."
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And after learning of the 31-year-old's passing on the evening of Oct. 16, Scherzinger — who met Payne while working as a judge on "The X Factor U.K.," where One Direction was created — still showed up to perform as Norma Desmond in the Broadway production.
"She’d just heard that he died," Webber continued, "and the fact that she even did the show at all is extraordinary. I mean, she is an amazing, amazing woman. She is without any question one of the finest performers I’ve ever worked with."
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He added, "One thing about Nicole is that once she’s committed to something, she is the most incredible company member and leader of any performer I know."
When it comes to the members of One Direction, Scherzinger wasn't just a longtime supporter of Payne, who died of "multiple traumas" and "internal and external hemorrhage" following a fatal three-story fall from a hotel balcony in Buenos Aires, Argentina, according to his autopsy.
After all, recently unearthed footage from the reality competition series revealed that the "Baby Love" singer was the judge who had the idea to put Liam, Zayn Malik, Harry Styles, Niall Horan and Louis Tomlinson in a boy band.
In the clip shared to YouTube in 2022, Scherzinger instructed fellow judge Simon Cowell to place photos of the teens together "as an imaginary boy group" while they deliberated over which contestants to move on to the next round.
"They're just too talented to get rid of," Scherzinger argued. "And they've got just the right look and the right charisma on stage. I think they'll be really great in a boy band together."
And once it was decided they would stick them into a group, the 46-year-old couldn't have been more thrilled.
"They're like little stars," Scherzinger gushed, "so you can't get rid of little stars. You put them all together."
