Originally Posted by Lorelei Lee:
“That's funny, cos I thought that's pretty much what Ashley's done, with the odd reference to 'extension'. I'd say there's been very little strictly dance-related chat from either Ashley or Jason, the supposed experts, this year. They've couched all their comments in terms of 'entertainment' or 'emotion' or 'personality', not 'dance quality'.
Characterisation in dance is a different skill from acting and should be remarked on differently. I for one would wonder what the hell an actor with no or limited understanding of a physical artistic discipline was doing on the panel.
For all her faults, last time I checked Karen did technically qualify as a female judge who skated as part of a pair at a professional level. I forget whether that was pairs or ice dance, but as this programme's hardly making a technical distinction on that I think we can let it pass.
Plus, as a respected choreographer in his own right, is Robin not qualified to judge what a female skater can and should be doing as part of a couple?
They have about 30 seconds to give their opinion on 90 seconds of skating. Whatever comes out of their mouth is inevitably going to be an abbreviated version of what they thought. A fuller analysis of a routine's good and bad points, technical faults etc. might allow us more insight into the marking. Ashley and Jason are invariably going to mark subjectively because performance appreciation is a subjective thing, but that's part and parcel of any artistic discipline.
If you don't like what the judges say, then that's a bit different from being able to prove bias.”
Indeed, but Ashley and Jason are both very random on whether dance, let alone details of dance, matters. "Fun" overides it with Keith, posture is ignored with Matt in favour of sex appeal. If "you are having fun, and I had fun watching you have fun " is the criteria to judge performance and entertainment" they might as well not be there. You just can't throw marks out for ham acting, having fun, or being attractive to some judge, and then complain about someone elses fingers. Worse, you can't deduct marks for looking as if you are concentrating, and fail to note or mark the fact that the person is doing a move thats far more difficult and striking than anyone else has tried.
Ruthie was far better qualified than Jason to judge characterisation or acting or emoting or whatever you wnat to call it. . She's played the leading roles he never has, and she's qialified as a dancer and danced the leading stage dance roles he hasn't too. He seems to like ham acting, but there's more to acting than panto. Its going to be subjective anyway , but some people are alot better at it than others.
Karen actually ends up, usually, with one of the more accurate marks. Because she isn't as driven by skating technique, fun or personal preference. She can't say much critically though, she tends to avoid the discouraging mark, and she tends to follow the party line.
Robin has now been marking the same way, increasingly, for three series. Its as if he's taken on some of Nicky's technical role, and abandoned his own overview role for a male perspective. He''s basically overmarking male content and undervaluing female. When it happens continually it looks like a bias - not a series of coincidental choices. Is there any evidence that he can choregraph female roles well to counter the long list of male skaters and their attributes that he's rewarded with more marks? Has he adjusted his expectations of the females properly, or worked out how not to mark the choregraphers? He seems to have throttled back from last series where he ruined key routines by pressing for more impossible technical difficulty, but he's just not marking on an equal basis.
Nearly all of the judges have another, over-riding problem - they now spend most of their time critiquing something that was decided before anyone put a foot on the ice. Robin often critiques the choregraphy and rewards the bits he approves of. Jason puts his own assumptions in what the choregraphy should look like. He often wants something better than what was there, or what was taught. Ashley likes people who habitually smile a lot.
No judge is actually asking or marking the key question - how difficult, exciting, or entertaining is that? The result is the marking just suggests entertainment quality that isn't there, and doesn't highlight what actually would make viewers tune in.
