Dog trainer Sara Carson got emotional during her appearance on America's Got Talent show Tuesday night...and for good reason.
It looked like she was about to get voted off...until one of the judges took a highly unusual step.
"When Howie [Mandel] gave his 'no' I was pretty calm and collected," she remembers. "I thought 'it's ok, not a big deal' and then as soon as Mel B said 'I have to agree with Howie' I burst into tears because I'd given up so much to be on that show and worked my entire life for that moment. It was a heart-crunching experience.
"I'd grown up with people telling me that what I do is dumb and not worth the time and effort that I'd put into it, and it's 'not a career'. Then on America's Got Talent in front of 51 million viewers, and the judges do the same thing, so it was like it felt like it was a waste, and everybody was right at that moment."
But then one judge, Simon Cowell, lept to her rescue.
“Trust me on this, I saw something you didn’t see,” Cowell begged the other judges. It worked!
See: Simon Cowell Shows Amazing HEART Steps In To Save Dog Trainer
Carson laughs as she recalls the moment. "The second he got out of his chair I just collapsed on stage and started hugging Hero and thought 'Oh my God, something is going to go down right now and I'm not ready for it.
"It was absolutely incredible. I cried more because it was almost like a shock because at that point I was literally concerned I was off the show. It was a roller coaster of emotions. I felt excited. I felt frustrated. I felt angry. I felt sad. I felt overwhelmed, and then I started thinking about how the hell I'm going to be better so I can impress all the judges next time so it was quite a roller coaster."
So now the challenge is to meet the judge's new expectations.
"The fun thing with my act is that it's literally a different routine every time you perform so I'll have a new theme, I'll have new tricks and I'll have new costumes so I have the opportunity to be better that I already was. I believe the next time I appear on the show it's going to be pretty incredible."
See: UPDATE: Sara gets through. (America's Got Talent has a local flavour tonight)
Sara admits to feeling the pressure before the show.
"The pressure of performing in front of the world...America's Got Talent is not just America. The acts on there, half of them are not American so the show is really a worldwide thing. It's different from my Letterman appearance (David Letterman Show) because Letterman, I was 17 and didn't realize how big the show was until after the fact. But going into America's Got Talent, I knew how big the show was. It's not something everybody gets to experience."
She doesn't know when the next show with her on it will air, but expects to be told "in the next week or two."
