Antonella Barba Nude Photos Help Her Survive American Idol Cut

Will America ever tire of Antonella Barba?  Not this week.  She was not voted off of American idol despite dire perditions of her demise.  The New Jersey gal is safe and survived the week two cuts.  A Reuters story titled 'American Idol sex scandal may be short-lived' reported that the new sex scandal that hit could be over Thursday night if a contestant purportedly shown in some racy photos is voted off the show.  They just don't get it.

Antonella Barba Nude Photos Help Her Survive American Idol Cut

This is a popularity contest.  She may not have the best pipes, but she has a great body and it is all over the web, and that means she was going to stay.  I'm guessing it wasn't even that close.  That said, she is the absolute worst singer left on the female side.  But this is pop music and pop culture and she has the edge.

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Celebrity judge Simon Cowell and fellow producer Nigel Lythgoe said in separate media interviews this week that Barba's future is entirely up to fans who vote on the contestants.  Appearing at a Playboy mansion party on Wednesday, Cowell said, "I think it's disgraceful that so-called friends would sell these pictures. It's private property."

A spokesman for Fox, a unit of Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. , said the network does "not comment on the personal lives of our show participants." And nothing about the scandal has been said on the show itself.

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Barba, a 20-year-old former college student from New Jersey, has kept mum about the photos. But her friend Amanda Coluccio, a fellow "American Idol" hopeful who was eliminated from the contest earlier this season, said that only the least graphic photos are of Barba.

Josh Hart noted earlier that Nick Pedro is the first to go on Thursday.  Following him was 'Not Ready to Make Nice' Alaina Alexander.  AJ Tabaldo is now gone.  And the final elimination is no stunner, Leslie Hunt is done.