Kara DioGuardi warms to the hot seat

The "American Idol" personality is largely id-driven: The pleasures the talent show offers are immediate, whether a singer soars or sinks. And the show around the show can yield even more merriment, as it spews out a ceaseless stream of news/gossip generated by the contestants' biographical details, the judges' antics, behind-the-scenes backstabbing that may or may not be fictional and, often least important, discussion of the results of the actual singing competition.

But Kara DioGuardi -- who became the show's fourth judge this season in the most visible manifestation of its much-hyped tweaks -- is all superego. And her weekly critiques, delivered live on Fox before an average audience of 26 million viewers, tend to weigh heavily on her mind.

"It wakes me up at night," DioGuardi said the day after a performance show. "Can you imagine? Last night I woke up in the middle of the night and I thought, 'I've got to look at those performances. Did I clock that one wrong? Why didn't I say that? I could have been more supportive.' "

So as Season 8 draws to a close Wednesday, the question rises: Will the union of DioGuardi, the thriving songwriter, and "American Idol," the only massively popular television show, last?

Before this season, the alchemy of the withering/accurate Simon Cowell, the kindly hysteric Paula Abdul and the axiomatic Randy Jackson worked well enough -- the trio had gelled over the years to become a cartoonish family. But during Season 7, as Cowell looked increasingly bored, as Jackson's pith grew more repetitive ("You worked it out, baby, you worked it out") and as Abdul famously and embarrassingly forgot how many songs a contestant had already performed, one did begin to wonder whether they were even paying attention anymore.

And then there was the matter of the legacy judges' contracts. Abdul's expires after this season, Cowell's runs out after next season and Jackson is booked through 2011.

So whether DioGuardi was brought in to shake things up on the panel (as Fox and "Idol" producers have insisted) or to be a bargaining chip against the other judges, she -- as the new kid -- has been a polarizing figure to the "Idol" audience.

Mike Darnell, Fox's president of alternative entertainment, said, "I think it's very difficult to come into a situation where you have three known family members and you're coming in as the fourth cousin."