Wow. I haven't seen such a night of drama since the A-Team episode that guest-starred Boy George. Where to begin? At the start would be sensible place…
In many ways the waltz from Rachel and Vincent was business-as-usual ballroom from the pint-sized popstress. Graceful, delicate, pretty. They did a move where Rachel held her head against Vincent as they moved which seemed very familiar. I tried to remember where I had seen it before and then it came to me - it was from their own Viennese waltz! Is it possible to plagiarise yourself? The judges were impressed but Len pointed out that he couldn't actually see her footwork. Well now you know how the audience feels about the camera work each week! A score of 39 points on the first dance of the night clearly left the judges with little room for manoeuvre and one suspected that it may well be raining tens this evening.
Next up were Lisa and Brendan performing a foxtrot and it was a typical Snowdon routine: Step 1: Face of abject fear backstage. Step 2: Hide the fear behind a smile when walking out but over-compensate on said smile and end up with an expression like The Joker from Batman. Step 3: A rather fine dance. Step 4: Finish dance and look desperately for Brendan to let her know if it was OK. Fortunately for Lisa, Step 3 is what counts and the judges gave the second 39 point score of the evening.
And so to Christine and Matthew. Mark Foster was a guest on It Takes Two last week and, whilst sitting next to Jessie Wallace, made the comment that Bruno thinks Lisa has the best legs in the competition. Mark then elaborated by saying: "and that's a real compliment when you consider she is up against the likes of Cherie and Christine. Oh, and Jessie". The reason I mention this is that it reminded me of the judges claims that "we are now left with five excellent dancers". Mr Foster might choose to phrase this as "We are left with excellent dancers like Austin, Tom, Rachel and Lisa. Oh, and Christine". The hard truth is that as lovely a person as Ms Bleakley is, she has never quite ranked alongside the best when it comes to dance talent. Her tango was noticeably worse than the previous two dances and at times it appeared that Matthew was dancing with one of those puppets that Colin Jackson danced with. That said, her score of 28 was perhaps a little harsh given that six tens had already been given out that evening.
We were then treated to our second foxtrot of evening, this time from Austin and Erin. Truth be told, having already seen a foxtrot, I felt a bit foxtrotted out and couldn't get excited about this one, even though it was pretty good. 36 points was the score.
We were then treated to our third foxtrot of the evening, this time from Captain Camembert and Camilla. Truth be told, having already seen two foxtrots, I felt a bit foxtrotted out and couldn't get excited about this one, even though it was pretty good. Len pointed out that Tom kept sticking his backside out but he was going to ignore it. This seemed more than a little unfair and one could almost hear the cry of anguish from Andrew Castle. The score of 35 points included a 10 from Len which just screamed "charity!". On the positive side, at least Claudia won't be able to continue asking Tom how much he would like a 10 now. Look out next week for "So, Tom, how much would you like a second 10?".
That brought the ballroom section to a close and I barely had time to wake myself up before Rachel and Vincent were performing a Paso Doble. The thing that first struck me was that although the band are quite adept at Swing and Latin music, they really stink at 80s Spandex Rock. What they did to "The Final Countdown" bordered on sacrilege. The vocals were not so much "Joey Tempest" as "Joey Gentle-Breeze" and in keeping with song's age, the music was played on Casio keyboard from 1988. Once I managed to focus on the dance I noticed that 1) Vincent did some fancy cape work and 2) Rachel was performing a dramatic dance. I therefore braced myself for 1) Len to say there was too much messing around and 2) Arlene to say Rachel's eyes weren't telling the story. And this is exactly what happened. How soporific. 32 points seemed a touch harsh but I was just glad the music had finished.
Next up were Lisa and Brendan performing a Cha Cha Cha. I don't know where Brendan gets his inspiration for song choices but I suspect he spends a lot of time phoning call centres and being placed on hold. Not for the first time this series, we had a Latin dance to a very mid tempo song. The dance was technically pretty good and perhaps even deserved its 37 points but I was crying out for more excitement. If only I had known what was to come!
Christine and Matthew brought some fun back to proceedings with their Salsa. The judges commented that they liked seeing her smile and that this kind of dance suits her. For a moment I wondered if I was back in week 2 but no, Craig's hip new haircut confirmed it was definitely week 11. Christine did very well to still appear interested by these comments after hearing nearly identical ones for eleven weeks running. 30 points seemed stingy in my opinion as it was probably the most entertaining dance of the night so far. Sadly for them, this was only true for a couple more minutes…
Austin and Erin's Paso Doble was the dance with the most impact of the series so far. It started by putting questions in the viewers' minds: why aren't they saying anything backstage? Why have the lights dimmed? Where has Austin's shirt gone? Is that Fonzie in the audience? Before we knew it, Austin had stamped his feet, jumped around a bit and shouted "Olé". There was a ripple of nervous laughter and then a ripple of applause from the audience. And then Austine and Erin let rip with the most powerful delivery of a dance we have seen this series. Full of stamps, shouts and flamenco, the series finally gave us a bullfighting dance that was full of fight rather than full of bull. The studio audience loved it and gave a standing ovation. Craig, Arlene and Bruno loved it and awarded 10s. Len said it had no actual dance content and gave it an 8. Difficult to say who was right. Maybe we should have a debate on this forum about whether SCD is a dancing contest or an entertainment show?……!
Final dance of the night was Tom and Camilla doing a samba and it seemed Captain Camembert had been promoted to Brigadier Brie. This was a performance with the Tom dial turned to ten. A silver shirt so loud it threatened to drown out the band, little glances at the camera, the whole routine dripped with curdled milk. As the A-Team's tough guy, I really shouldn't be entertained by such campery but I couldn't help myself! Having earlier given him a ten to keep him happy, the judges reverted to form and awarded a clutch of 9s and an 8 to give 35 points.
Sunday
Yes, that WAS Fonzie in the audience!
Rachel v Christine dance off, Christine goes home, Vincent cries. My personal highlight though was Tess concluding an interview with Louisa Lytton by saying "it's nice to see you again" to which Cherie Lunghi, one place along from Louisa and no part of the interview, replied "thankyou"!
See you later, Crazy Fools!
In many ways the waltz from Rachel and Vincent was business-as-usual ballroom from the pint-sized popstress. Graceful, delicate, pretty. They did a move where Rachel held her head against Vincent as they moved which seemed very familiar. I tried to remember where I had seen it before and then it came to me - it was from their own Viennese waltz! Is it possible to plagiarise yourself? The judges were impressed but Len pointed out that he couldn't actually see her footwork. Well now you know how the audience feels about the camera work each week! A score of 39 points on the first dance of the night clearly left the judges with little room for manoeuvre and one suspected that it may well be raining tens this evening.
Next up were Lisa and Brendan performing a foxtrot and it was a typical Snowdon routine: Step 1: Face of abject fear backstage. Step 2: Hide the fear behind a smile when walking out but over-compensate on said smile and end up with an expression like The Joker from Batman. Step 3: A rather fine dance. Step 4: Finish dance and look desperately for Brendan to let her know if it was OK. Fortunately for Lisa, Step 3 is what counts and the judges gave the second 39 point score of the evening.
And so to Christine and Matthew. Mark Foster was a guest on It Takes Two last week and, whilst sitting next to Jessie Wallace, made the comment that Bruno thinks Lisa has the best legs in the competition. Mark then elaborated by saying: "and that's a real compliment when you consider she is up against the likes of Cherie and Christine. Oh, and Jessie". The reason I mention this is that it reminded me of the judges claims that "we are now left with five excellent dancers". Mr Foster might choose to phrase this as "We are left with excellent dancers like Austin, Tom, Rachel and Lisa. Oh, and Christine". The hard truth is that as lovely a person as Ms Bleakley is, she has never quite ranked alongside the best when it comes to dance talent. Her tango was noticeably worse than the previous two dances and at times it appeared that Matthew was dancing with one of those puppets that Colin Jackson danced with. That said, her score of 28 was perhaps a little harsh given that six tens had already been given out that evening.
We were then treated to our second foxtrot of evening, this time from Austin and Erin. Truth be told, having already seen a foxtrot, I felt a bit foxtrotted out and couldn't get excited about this one, even though it was pretty good. 36 points was the score.
We were then treated to our third foxtrot of the evening, this time from Captain Camembert and Camilla. Truth be told, having already seen two foxtrots, I felt a bit foxtrotted out and couldn't get excited about this one, even though it was pretty good. Len pointed out that Tom kept sticking his backside out but he was going to ignore it. This seemed more than a little unfair and one could almost hear the cry of anguish from Andrew Castle. The score of 35 points included a 10 from Len which just screamed "charity!". On the positive side, at least Claudia won't be able to continue asking Tom how much he would like a 10 now. Look out next week for "So, Tom, how much would you like a second 10?".
That brought the ballroom section to a close and I barely had time to wake myself up before Rachel and Vincent were performing a Paso Doble. The thing that first struck me was that although the band are quite adept at Swing and Latin music, they really stink at 80s Spandex Rock. What they did to "The Final Countdown" bordered on sacrilege. The vocals were not so much "Joey Tempest" as "Joey Gentle-Breeze" and in keeping with song's age, the music was played on Casio keyboard from 1988. Once I managed to focus on the dance I noticed that 1) Vincent did some fancy cape work and 2) Rachel was performing a dramatic dance. I therefore braced myself for 1) Len to say there was too much messing around and 2) Arlene to say Rachel's eyes weren't telling the story. And this is exactly what happened. How soporific. 32 points seemed a touch harsh but I was just glad the music had finished.
Next up were Lisa and Brendan performing a Cha Cha Cha. I don't know where Brendan gets his inspiration for song choices but I suspect he spends a lot of time phoning call centres and being placed on hold. Not for the first time this series, we had a Latin dance to a very mid tempo song. The dance was technically pretty good and perhaps even deserved its 37 points but I was crying out for more excitement. If only I had known what was to come!
Christine and Matthew brought some fun back to proceedings with their Salsa. The judges commented that they liked seeing her smile and that this kind of dance suits her. For a moment I wondered if I was back in week 2 but no, Craig's hip new haircut confirmed it was definitely week 11. Christine did very well to still appear interested by these comments after hearing nearly identical ones for eleven weeks running. 30 points seemed stingy in my opinion as it was probably the most entertaining dance of the night so far. Sadly for them, this was only true for a couple more minutes…
Austin and Erin's Paso Doble was the dance with the most impact of the series so far. It started by putting questions in the viewers' minds: why aren't they saying anything backstage? Why have the lights dimmed? Where has Austin's shirt gone? Is that Fonzie in the audience? Before we knew it, Austin had stamped his feet, jumped around a bit and shouted "Olé". There was a ripple of nervous laughter and then a ripple of applause from the audience. And then Austine and Erin let rip with the most powerful delivery of a dance we have seen this series. Full of stamps, shouts and flamenco, the series finally gave us a bullfighting dance that was full of fight rather than full of bull. The studio audience loved it and gave a standing ovation. Craig, Arlene and Bruno loved it and awarded 10s. Len said it had no actual dance content and gave it an 8. Difficult to say who was right. Maybe we should have a debate on this forum about whether SCD is a dancing contest or an entertainment show?……!
Final dance of the night was Tom and Camilla doing a samba and it seemed Captain Camembert had been promoted to Brigadier Brie. This was a performance with the Tom dial turned to ten. A silver shirt so loud it threatened to drown out the band, little glances at the camera, the whole routine dripped with curdled milk. As the A-Team's tough guy, I really shouldn't be entertained by such campery but I couldn't help myself! Having earlier given him a ten to keep him happy, the judges reverted to form and awarded a clutch of 9s and an 8 to give 35 points.
Sunday
Yes, that WAS Fonzie in the audience!
Rachel v Christine dance off, Christine goes home, Vincent cries. My personal highlight though was Tess concluding an interview with Louisa Lytton by saying "it's nice to see you again" to which Cherie Lunghi, one place along from Louisa and no part of the interview, replied "thankyou"!
See you later, Crazy Fools!
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