Despite rumor mill, 'Idol' life good for Utahns

Two months after he finished second on "American Idol," life is pretty darn good for David Archuleta. As the "Idol" tour rolls into Utah for a two-night stand, the future looks bright.

"Everything is wonderful right now," his father, Jeff, told the Deseret News. "The opportunities are great. The support on the tour for David has been unbelievable. (Saturday) night in Tacoma, it blew my mind how many people there were supporting David.

"Even I couldn't go anywhere without being swarmed by people. People wanted my picture. They had me signing stuff ... which was totally weird," he said with a laugh.

And a pleasant change from this past spring, when Jeff Archuleta was the subject of unsubstantiated and unfair tabloid stories making him out to be the stage father from hell. Stories that violated a basic rule of journalism — not one story was attributed to anything other than an unnamed source.

The tabloid attacks actually began when TMZ printed a story alleging that 17-year-old David was a phony — that his bashful, self-deprecating behavior was all an act.

"I think once TMZ realized that everyone they talked with verified that David really was that down-to-earth and unassuming and un- pretentious, they needed a different target," Jeff Archuleta said.

And they turned on him with a vengeance. The week David forgot some of the lyrics to his song, unsubstantiated stories appeared that his father yelled at him and made him cry during a recording session. And that Jeff had withheld water from his son.

Jeff Archuleta was understandably baffled.

"Everyone at Fox was really supportive," he said. "Everybody on the show was, like, 'Jeff — welcome to the business. This is what tabloid journalism is about.'

"I was, like, 'This isn't even true.' And they said, 'It doesn't have to be."'

They tried to assure him that most people would know none of the gossip was true.

"I said, 'But there are a lot of people out there that aren't going to know. And they're going to think that it really happened."'

But he couldn't respond. All the contestants and their immediate family members had to sign confidentiality agreements. The only interviews they could do were those arranged by Fox.

Another story claimed Jeff angered producers by adding lyrics to David's performance of "Stand by Me." The truth, Jeff said, is that the change had been approved by "Idol" producers.

"Everybody said, 'Oh, yeah. That's a great idea.' No one ever told us that there was anything wrong with that or that we shouldn't. That was totally manufactured."

Recent comments