The Good, the Bad, and the Awkward
Season 9 of Dancing With the Stars started on Monday night, September 21, 2009, with performances by the eight male celebrities.Aaron Carter was a former child pop star, apparently quite a famous one, but I never heard of him. He did the cha-cha with Karina Smirnoff and was very good, dancing with plenty of energy and style. He will go far on the show, maybe even to the finals. Just as I was thinking that he had looked so comfortable on the dance floor that he must have had dance experience, hostess Samantha asked him about exactly that.
Chuck Liddel, Ultimate Fighting Champion, did the foxtrot with Anna Trebunskaya. He tried, but dance is not his thing. He was stiff and looked like a dancing robot. He had a lot of charm, though, and the audience liked him. The spectacle of someone sincerely trying to learn something far outside of his comfort zone might keep him alive until the middle of the season.
Martial artist and Host of "Iron Chef" Mark Dacascos danced with Lacey Schwimmer, the pro who in previous seasons liked to get punked out in a watered-down ballroom kind of way. They did a martial-arts flavored cha-cha. Mark was flexible and had good hip action, but the performance could have been stronger and more passionate. I think he'll go far in the season, but not to the finals.
Ashley Hamilton, an actor and comedian whose biggest claim to fame is probably being the son of George Hamilton, had the same partner his father did when his father was on the show -- Edyta Sliwinska, the pro who likes to show the most skin. Ashley may get a lot of sympathy for surviving a serious motorcycle accident that left him in a wheelchair for a year. Plus he has a great smile, and he comes across as a nice guy. But he's a terrible dancer. I don't think he will last long.
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