- Source of Wealth: Television
- Age: 70
- Birth Place: Wirral Peninsula, United Kingdom
- Height: 1.8 m (5′ 11″)
- Weight: 75 kg (165.35 lbs)
- Marital Status: Divorced (Bonnie Lythgoe)
- Full Name: Nigel Lythgoe
- Nationality: British
- Date of Birth: 9 July 1949
- Ethnicity: English
- Occupation: Television Producer
- Education: Hylton-Bromley School of Dance and Drama and the Perry Cowell School of Dance
- Children: 2 (Simon and Chris)
English television director, producer, and former dancer, Nigel Lythgoe has an estimated net worth of $110 million. He began his career as talent, performing on television with the BBC dance ensemble Young Generation in England; he subsequently moved into behind-the-scenes work, initially as a choreographer on innumerable U.K.-based music series. Ten years after a brief stint as a choreographer on a Hollywood feature in 1980, Lythgoe began turning out reality series en masse in an executive producer capacity, with a phenomenal degree of success. These included: You Bet! (1989), Fox’s American Idol, Popstars, So You Think You Can Dance, and The Next Great American Band. He is recognized as one of the preeminent godfathers of early 21st-century reality television and has earned a reputation for his blunt and brutal but well-meaning forthrightness about the cult of the celebrity among average Middle Americans, as well as his laudable willingness to disillusion those with big-star dreams who lacked the ability to back them up. Born in Wirral, England on 9 July 1949. Lythgoe was married to Bonita Shawe, they have two sons together.