X Factor Backstage Scoop: Who's One Direction Voting For? And Why Will Mario Be Drinking Less?

Five things to know about Thursday's show

One Direction caused mass hysteria in The X Factor studio on Thursday night with their two performances—which even Lea Michele turned up to check out!—and backstage after the show, the boy-banders were still working their magic on the ladies.

Khloé Kardashian-Odom was in the middle of chatting with the press when Harry Styles and Niall Horan suddenly crashed the interview to plant kisses on her cheek and compliment her cohosting skills. The pair then proceeded to pick up reporters' recorders and start peppering her with some questions of their own. "Have you pre-ordered our new album?" asked Styles, in a moment of savvy promotion. "Take Me Home it's called."

After Kardashian Odom left, the 1D boys stuck around to good-naturedly rip on their record-label boss, Simon Cowell—"he looks a lot older," quipped Styles—and to voice their support for one X Factor contestant in particular. "I'll [have] a big phone bill from voting for Beatrice Miller," Styles said. "I think she's wicked. She has the coolest voice."

 

"And she's so charismatic," chimed in Horan.

"And just a really nice girl," added Styles, officially making Miller the envy of the world's entire female tween population.

Here, a few other things we learned during a lively night in the X Factor VIP tent:

Mario Lopez may seem über-smooth on air, but on Thursday night, the cohost came thisclose to losing his cool during one commercial break. "I had to go to the restroom and I made it back with literally with like four seconds [to spare]," he revealed. "I had to check my pants to make sure I didn't pee on myself! I gotta watch my fluid intake from now on."

Once again, Teens mentor Britney Spears was the first to hit the tent, and she chatted with reporters for just over twice as long as she had last week (a whole minute and 42 seconds!). Brit-Brit was clearly happy all three of her teen divas were safe, though she insisted they should've ranked higher in the voting results. (Carly Rose Sonenclar came in second, Diamond White was fourth and Miller was revealed to be in tenth place.) "I was surprised by the rankings," Spears said. "I really was. I thought, of course, my people should've been at No. 1 through 5." (Hey, if the living legend who gave us such immortal pop gems as "…Baby One More Time" and "Toxic" wants her three contestants to somehow take up five spots, who are we to ask how that would even be possible?)  

Regardless, Spears made it clear she was thrilled to have White back on her team: "There's just an angelic appeal about her. There's a je ne sais quoi thing that you can't really explain, and when we had to vote her off of the show, it was one of the hardest things I've ever had to do, so I'm glad we brought her back."

(And, for the record, while Spears was accompanied by a publicist and fiancé Jason Trawick was never far from her side, no one was feeding her lines to say. We were seated right next to her and can vouch that Brit's ears were totally IFB-free.) 

Despite just getting the boot, Jason "Mr. Entertainment" Brock was in pretty good spirits, frequently laughing and even bestowing hugs on reporters. As for why, right after his elimination, he gave a shout-out to "the gays and Japan," Brock had this to say: "I got to tell everyone my two passions—gays andJapan. I just wanted to make a statement and make sure gay people got attention and that me being gay got attention. I thought that was kind of important because I wanted people to know me as a gay person. And my boyfriend lives in Japan—he's Japanese, and I personally love Japan and visited recently. I wanna go back and maybe even work there. I just wanted it to be clear that I really love Japan. Somebody give me a job in Japan!"

Cowell admitted he wasn't exactly surprised to see Brock go ("He couldn't win," said the ever-blunt judge.) He was much more enthusiastic about the decision to reveal the full order of this week's voting results, a first for a singing competition. "I suggested this about three or four weeks ago," Cowell explained. "The one thing everyone wants to know, including me, every week is who won. I said, 'Why don't we just tell everyone and see what happens?' At first everyone was like, 'You can't do that,' and I said, 'Yeah you can.' I think it's changed the dynamic of the show now, particularly for me because I thought [the group] acts were doing much better than was revealed tonight." (Most surprisingly, perceived favorites Emblem3 were revealed to be in sixth place for the week.)

Added a determined Cowell: "We have to change a few things up now."

The results also had Young Adults mentor Demi Lovato, who bickered bitterly with Cowell during Wednesday's performance show, reconsidering some of her own decisions—and maybe (gasp!) taking some of Cowell's advice. (Her acts came in seventh, eighth and twelfth respectively.) "I think that he [was] right," she admitted of Cowell. "I don't wanna seem like I'm selling out or anything, but I definitely do think I need to think of some of the things Simon said. Maybe dye CeCe [Frey]'s hair back or whatever, because obviously whatever I'm doing isn't working. This is my first time mentoring. It's still a learning opportunity for me. But I [wanna] help these girls become the pop stars that they deserve to be."