It’s the crossover none of us knew we desperately needed: American Idol and The Rookie!
Yes, you read that right. American Idol is coming to The Rookie this week for a truly unexpected yet delightful crossover, and E! News has your first look at the slightly surreal event, which brings Lucy Chen (Melissa O’Neil) and Tim Bradford (Eric Winter) to the Los Angeles auditions of American Idol in search of a man who is apparently making and selling meth smoothies.
Somehow, Chen gets mistaken for a contestant, and ends up being pushed into the audition room. Hopefully that means we’ll get to hear her sing!
You can get a sneak peek in the clip above, and see Chen and Bradford mingling with Ryan Seacrest and judges Katy Perry, Luke Bryan, and Lionel Ritchie in the photos below while you wonder if this could get more surreal.
You may notice in this first photo that Chen is holding a golden ticket, which might just mean her audition was successful and she’s heading to Hollywood.
Melissa O’Neil actually has quite a bit of experience with Idol, since she competed on Canadian Idol and actually won season three back in 2005.
The episode, titled “The Overnight,” also features Chen befriending a reporter whose motives are not clear.
Idol, meanwhile, is in Hawaii! This Sunday’s episode will reveal the top 20 after the top 40 finish performing in their showcase, and features “a shocking first-ever twist in the show’s history for two contestants that no one saw coming.”
While Idol producers are monitoring the pandemic situation in terms of how to move forward with live shows, there are several more pre-recorded episodes to come this season. This Sunday is the second episode filmed in Hawaii, and on April 12 and April 19, ABC will air two new episodes titled “American Idol: This Is Me,” which is a deeper look into the lives of the top 20 contestants.
American Idol airs at 8 p.m. and The Rookie airs at 10 p.m., Sundays on ABC.