Dancing with the Stars Season 3, Episode 6
With only five pairs remaining, we are fast approaching the last leg of the competition. Aside from Jerry, who clearly stands out as the anomaly, the other four pairs deserve their place at this stage of the competition. It will be increasingly difficult to choose the top three, as each presents its own strengths and weaknesses on the dance floor.
However, Mario López and Karina Smirnoff seem to have an advantage at this point. Week after week, they exude the right balance of energy, passion, and chemistry. Mario is the best famous dancer on the show, while Karina is undoubtedly the best professional dancer on the show; together they are a winning combination.
This week, once again, they sizzled on the dance floor with some very energetic samba. However, I found myself having trouble concentrating on Mario, because Karina overshadowed him a bit with her sensational samba performance. It is very difficult to take your eyes off her because she is an incredibly incredible dancer.
This week, Monique Coleman and Louis van Amstel raised the energy level much higher than usual with their upbeat and funky samba. Monique indulged in a solo opening that was more reminiscent of street dancing than samba, which may have hurt her scores, but proved that she could let her personality come out of its protective shell.
While the choreography itself lacked the usual festive and exotic flavor of samba, it contained many classic samba movements, such as samba rolls and ride races. To say that routine is nothing like samba would be unfair. Surely a dancer of Louis van Amstel’s caliber would know better than any of those judges what a samba is.
Joey Lawrence and Edyta Sliwinska danced a sensual and chemistry-filled rumba last night. However, I have to say that seeing Edyta’s long white dress stick to her heels every now and then was a bit annoying. Also, I felt like Joey didn’t show proper rumba technique. Like Mario’s dance, Joey’s dance tends to look “clipped” and unfinished. Her rumba seemed a bit robotic next to Edyta’s smooth, sensual hip movements. In the pursuit of sharpness, Joey sacrifices the fluid quality of this dance.
What makes rumba so difficult is that both sharpness and smoothness must be achieved. Rumba is the dance of contrastimation and contradiction where the couple goes from heartbreak to romantic bliss, from betrayal to passion, from conflict to love in the space of a few moments, sometimes even in fractions of a second. Both movements and facial expressions should show those quick transitions.
Jerry Springer gave another comedic performance with his killer parody of the pasodoble. It’s pretty clear that Jerry is ready to go home, and in fact, he’s almost begging the audience to let him go.
Who should go: don’t even ask. You know who should go.
Who will go: Jerrymeister. We hope your low scores from the judges help with that.