Sunday, March 21, 2010
Thin Ice Results Show: More Fun Than A Bucket of NCAA Balls? You Tell Me...
When you skate… on the Thin Ice…
I forgot to include that theme song for this show among my dislikes on Friday. It sounds like a cut from a British prog-rock album circa 1977. Who knows the artist on this ditty? Am I close? I just don’t think it makes for very appealing TV theme music… though I’m sure it would be perfect at a cast party for Sweeney Todd. (I've NO idea why I picked that show.)
OK, so the show has a similar start to Friday, except that we learn early on that the TV voter faves from Friday were… Shizuka and Stephane?! A little surprising. Combined totals had DuWeiss in the lead, Shiz/Steph tied for 2nd with Bourne/Zim, and SalLauzon 4th and BerezElletier 5th. Was the message sent by viewers Don’t separate our Sale/Pelletier?
First up today was (in reverse order of placement) BerezElletier. Since Steven Cousins is Their choreographer/David’s best friend/Elena’s main man, he gets prominent billing as we head into Carrie Underwood’s “Cowboy Cassanova”, with Elena sporting pigtails and some serious Daisy Dukes (Oh, and did anyone catch David cackling the line “It’s a LOVE STORY!!” at the end of their piece… I presume it was a nod to their Olympic program. Or maybe I was overthinking it. Anyway, BerezElletier seemed a little more at ease this time, but… not enough to blow it out of the water. 8’s from Kat/Dick/Kristi… a little higher than Friday.
Then came SalLauzon with “Hey Soul Sister” by Train… if they mentioned a choreographer here, I didn’t catch it because I was distracted by Jamie’s face in that little massage table thingie while she talked. So far there’s a lot of nonsense talk from everyone about who’s the boss in their respective partnerships… of course whenever the “boss” is the female, it’s considered Hi.LAR.I.OUS. The performance was a nice melding again; there was one lift that seemed a little awkward to me, but technically I think it was OK. Judges went 9-9-9… again, up a tic from Friday. I don’t remember anything after that because all I could see was Jamie’s big earring hooking up (quite literally) with a piece of Hasslebeck’s hair as they did the post-interview. They must’ve been dying for that camera to get off them immediately!
(By the way, I have to admit I’m entertained by the fact that Hasslebeck seems to have seen all the accolades of the skaters and thought “Dammit, they’d better mention my Emmy!!” as if that would put her in the ballpark. Or the same town. Or the same freaking PLANET. But I digress.)
Next up—hey, Lady Gaga’s “Poker Face”! I didn’t hear Johnny Weir was making an appearance… oh, guess he’s not. You mean someone else can skate to this? You mean someone else can skate to it AND be choreographed by the red-hot David Wilson? The other teams should be jealous. Anyway, Bourne/Zim were shiny and sexy and rocked it fabulously, especially considering they apparently just added a pairs lift TODAY. 10’s all around from the judges, including the joy of hearing Dick say “You pierced the mystique of Lady Gaga.” Classic.
Then we get another dose of Shizuka’s amazing new hair (ooh, flipped the other way this time… you’d think I never saw a bob haircut in my life, huh?) as she and Stephane work with another hip-hop choreographer doing skating for the first time? (Hi Hat is the name). They skate to Beyonce’s “Get Me Bodied” and yes, there’s more of an attempt at skating together… they even did perfectly synced SBS 3toes, damn!...but they kind of went on their own at spin time. Dick Button pointed out that there were still some “disjointed moments”, which of course elicited boos from the crowd… which prompted him to bark back “I know more than you do!” Word. Votes went 9-8-8; again up just a bit.
Finally, DuWeiss are up, and since Mike is wearing a suit w/no suitcoat, we get a hint… and yes, it’s a story piece about a guy who seems to love his briefcase more than Marie-France in a lavender slipdress. Immediately I think of the So You Think You Can Dance number from a few years ago (let’s just call that the Clip of the Day), but ironically this number’s choreographer is from Dancing w/the Stars (Mark Ballas, who won the trophy with Kristi). Big difference is that in this version, which is skated to “Broken String” by James Morrison, I think the woman wins out. (Which is to say the briefcase gets the boot. Just in case you weren’t sure. ;-) Oh, and Weiss pulled off not only a triple flip, but a back flip OVER a lunging Marie-France. Votes of 10-10-10.
Big goofy delay at the end, where they had to go to the judges to cover for a while they finished tabulating… but, that’s the magic of live TV. Finally, the peel-off got started as they named the order of who was getting which cheesy oversized check…
And the order remained the same, except for one flip-flop:
5th—BerezElletier
4th—SalLauzon
3rd—ShizSteph
2nd—BournZim
1st-- DuWeiss
So there you have it… is it “the future of figure skating”, as advertised? I kinda doubt it… but if it successfully triggers a manageable revival of pro skating competitions, well, as Dick would say, hat’s off to them. The early ratings news from Friday put Thin Ice in 3rd with 4.1 million viewers, 2.7 rating/5 share, which at first glance isn’t too bad… in the same slot a week earlier, Supernanny pulled down 4.9 million viewers, 3.2 rating/6 share. But either show was bound to face tough competition from March Madness over on CBS, so under the circumstances I think Thin Ice didn’t, uh… crack.
At least, not until we see what the numbers were for tonight. Carry-over is everything!
Coming all too soon (like tomorrow sometime)… the start of WORLDS PREDICTIONS!
Friday, March 19, 2010
Laying It On Thick For "Thin Ice"... oh, and Plushenko Lays Off Plans for Worlds
Before I get into Thin Ice… the review, I’d better alert you (if you didn’t hear it already; I’m no news-breaker)...
That Evgeny Plushenko, aka Plushy, Big Whiner, Platinum medalist, etc. is the latest (and maybe last, if only cuz they’re outta time) to withdraw from Worlds. I was hoping he’d also be announcing his early withdrawal from the Sochi Games he’s already committing to, but no dice on that one just yet. Gee, predicting Worlds Men just got a whole lot more interesting…
Anyway—here’s a peek at ABC’s Thin Ice from Friday 3/19:
I missed the first couple of minutes, but found a few things to like/dislike right away… (and by the way, I apologize in advance if my report is similar to my blogpal Laura over at Required Elements… we so often seem to be on the same page! I’m purposely not going to look at her report until after I’ve posted mine.)
+ LIKE: that they got this on the air at all… gosh, has it already been 3 ½ years since the last Ice Wars?
+ DISLIKE: the line early on about imagine replacing the classical skating music of the Olympics with hot pop tunes… as if the entire audience has never heard of such a concept, or seen Stars on Ice… or caught any of the exhibition gala from the Olympics, two weeks ago…
+ LIKE: Kurt Browning. DANG is he fun in roles like this. If he hadn’t clearly been born to skate, I’d be saying instead that he was clearly born to host. He even made Elizabeth Hasslebeck palatable. Well, until she was on her own, anyway.
+ DISLIKE: the fact that they somehow managed to get the stats wrong on Dick Button. Not 45 years in broadcasting, folks…try 50. (He made his commentating debut at the 1960 Winter Olympics in Squaw Valley.)
OK, on to the performances…
Shae-Lynn Bourne/John Zimmerman led things off with “Closer” by Ne-Yo… and made sure to do their part to dial the sexy-meter up to 11 (it would seem that’s what the show meant when it said “Our goal is simple: Entertain us”). B/Z manage to balance the ice dance/pair hybrid thing nicely, drawing a row of 9s from judges Button, Kristi Yamaguchi, and Katarina Witt.
Elena Berezhnaya/David Pelletier—yep, you read that right—skated together, but not before (of course) there was a re-telling of everyone’s favorite skating scandal. It then segued into cute cartoony music -- you know the kind—as, in the pre-produced piece, they had The Russian and The Canadian mock debating over who deserved gold more:
DAVID: Our skate was so hypnotizing; it just took people five days to realize that we were the best.
ELENA: When David looks at me, he just sees gold.
Once all that was out of the way, they skated to Katy Perry’s “Hot and Cold”…not badly at all, though they didn’t seem nearly as comfortable with each other as Bourne/Zimmerman (Gee, can’t imagine why). And I wish the choreography hadn’t been so telegraphed… you could see the carefully-worked-on-with-a-hip-hop-guru moves coming a mile away. But it was an interesting thing to see. Got 7’s (and a round of BOOOS) from Kristi and Kat, and an 8 from Button.
Next up: Jamie Sale/Patrice Lauzon… both skating without their regular partners, who happen to be their respective spouses. Jamie claims a lot of trash talking is going on between she and Pelletier over this event. Lauzon says he and his wife (skating later) have a weeks worth of massages riding on which one does better at this event. They skate to “Sexy Chick” by David Guetta, and it occurs to me I don’t recall seeing Lauzon ever skate to modern music…yes, he’s just as handsome doing that as he is the soft romantic stuff. They go 9-9-8 with the judges (Kristi is proving to be the most choosy of the bunch… go figure.)
They were followed by Shizuka Arakawa/Stephane Lambiel, the only all-singles “pair” in this event. Arakawa has a new (?) bob haircut that looks GORGEOUS on her, and is quite cute the way she explains she was always curious about skating pairs but “Japanese men are quite short… and I’m tall!” (and of course, “tall” in figure skating is around 5’5”.) Stephane talks about how tough the quad is—well, why not? Everyone else is these days. Then they shoot some questions and editing around to make it look like these two are interested in each other. I’m thinking no…have I mentioned her hair is GORGEOUS? Anyway, they skate to Robin Thicke’s “Magic Touch”, and it’s safe to say they didn’t have nearly enough time together to learn much in the way of skating as a pair. At first they kind of skate together, then it becomes a showcase of their best stuff: she does a triple salchow/double toe/double loop, he does a quad (oh, so that’s why…) and puts a mere hand down… probably better than he pulled off in Vancouver. They also show off some spins (duh). Of course they get complimented on the obvious (elements!) and dinged on the equally obvious (learn to skate like a pair!) 8’s all around for them.
Finally, here comes Marie-France Dubreil/Michael Weiss… and Fatima (was she the same choreographer that telegraphed the moves for Elena and David earlier? I dunno, but they spend enough time showing how this number came together off the ice that I’m expecting Lysacek to wander in from the DWTS set, saying “Uh, Mike, I’ve already got this studio booked for the next 3 hours”… So their music is the Black-Eyed Peas’ “Meet Me Halfway”, and Good God, something terrible has happened to BOTH of their lustrous heads of hair. I think a can of sculpting gel took their dressing room hostage. Oh, were they skating? Yeah, it was pretty good….got a lift or two managed, and she stayed out of the way while he did his back flip AGAIN (he did one in the opening of the show too). Skating last served them well… it would appear these judges were indeed saving room! 9-10-9 from them.
The score totals: Dubreil/Weiss have 28, Bourne/Zimmerman have 27, Sale/Lauzon have 26, Arakawa/Lambiel have 24, and Berezhnaya/Pelletier have 22. BUT now we’re supposed to go vote, vote, VOTE for our faves so they can have a winner for the people by Sunday’s show.
And as we’ve been hearing all week, Joannie Rochette closed out the evening with her ISU-approved performance of “Fly”. And a standing O from the crowd & judges. And hugs all around. Nice way to end the show.
Except for when Browning presented the cast at the end by saying “These are your Thin Ice skaters…” and I couldn’t help but hear it as if he was following it with a wave to a whole other group with the words “And THESE are your fat ice skaters…. Vote now!”
Sometimes I have no choice but to amuse my own bad self.
(P.S… if you want to catch the 2nd part of Thin Ice it’s on 7PM Eastern this Sunday.)
That Evgeny Plushenko, aka Plushy, Big Whiner, Platinum medalist, etc. is the latest (and maybe last, if only cuz they’re outta time) to withdraw from Worlds. I was hoping he’d also be announcing his early withdrawal from the Sochi Games he’s already committing to, but no dice on that one just yet. Gee, predicting Worlds Men just got a whole lot more interesting…
Anyway—here’s a peek at ABC’s Thin Ice from Friday 3/19:
I missed the first couple of minutes, but found a few things to like/dislike right away… (and by the way, I apologize in advance if my report is similar to my blogpal Laura over at Required Elements… we so often seem to be on the same page! I’m purposely not going to look at her report until after I’ve posted mine.)
+ LIKE: that they got this on the air at all… gosh, has it already been 3 ½ years since the last Ice Wars?
+ DISLIKE: the line early on about imagine replacing the classical skating music of the Olympics with hot pop tunes… as if the entire audience has never heard of such a concept, or seen Stars on Ice… or caught any of the exhibition gala from the Olympics, two weeks ago…
+ LIKE: Kurt Browning. DANG is he fun in roles like this. If he hadn’t clearly been born to skate, I’d be saying instead that he was clearly born to host. He even made Elizabeth Hasslebeck palatable. Well, until she was on her own, anyway.
+ DISLIKE: the fact that they somehow managed to get the stats wrong on Dick Button. Not 45 years in broadcasting, folks…try 50. (He made his commentating debut at the 1960 Winter Olympics in Squaw Valley.)
OK, on to the performances…
Shae-Lynn Bourne/John Zimmerman led things off with “Closer” by Ne-Yo… and made sure to do their part to dial the sexy-meter up to 11 (it would seem that’s what the show meant when it said “Our goal is simple: Entertain us”). B/Z manage to balance the ice dance/pair hybrid thing nicely, drawing a row of 9s from judges Button, Kristi Yamaguchi, and Katarina Witt.
Elena Berezhnaya/David Pelletier—yep, you read that right—skated together, but not before (of course) there was a re-telling of everyone’s favorite skating scandal. It then segued into cute cartoony music -- you know the kind—as, in the pre-produced piece, they had The Russian and The Canadian mock debating over who deserved gold more:
DAVID: Our skate was so hypnotizing; it just took people five days to realize that we were the best.
ELENA: When David looks at me, he just sees gold.
Once all that was out of the way, they skated to Katy Perry’s “Hot and Cold”…not badly at all, though they didn’t seem nearly as comfortable with each other as Bourne/Zimmerman (Gee, can’t imagine why). And I wish the choreography hadn’t been so telegraphed… you could see the carefully-worked-on-with-a-hip-hop-guru moves coming a mile away. But it was an interesting thing to see. Got 7’s (and a round of BOOOS) from Kristi and Kat, and an 8 from Button.
Next up: Jamie Sale/Patrice Lauzon… both skating without their regular partners, who happen to be their respective spouses. Jamie claims a lot of trash talking is going on between she and Pelletier over this event. Lauzon says he and his wife (skating later) have a weeks worth of massages riding on which one does better at this event. They skate to “Sexy Chick” by David Guetta, and it occurs to me I don’t recall seeing Lauzon ever skate to modern music…yes, he’s just as handsome doing that as he is the soft romantic stuff. They go 9-9-8 with the judges (Kristi is proving to be the most choosy of the bunch… go figure.)
They were followed by Shizuka Arakawa/Stephane Lambiel, the only all-singles “pair” in this event. Arakawa has a new (?) bob haircut that looks GORGEOUS on her, and is quite cute the way she explains she was always curious about skating pairs but “Japanese men are quite short… and I’m tall!” (and of course, “tall” in figure skating is around 5’5”.) Stephane talks about how tough the quad is—well, why not? Everyone else is these days. Then they shoot some questions and editing around to make it look like these two are interested in each other. I’m thinking no…have I mentioned her hair is GORGEOUS? Anyway, they skate to Robin Thicke’s “Magic Touch”, and it’s safe to say they didn’t have nearly enough time together to learn much in the way of skating as a pair. At first they kind of skate together, then it becomes a showcase of their best stuff: she does a triple salchow/double toe/double loop, he does a quad (oh, so that’s why…) and puts a mere hand down… probably better than he pulled off in Vancouver. They also show off some spins (duh). Of course they get complimented on the obvious (elements!) and dinged on the equally obvious (learn to skate like a pair!) 8’s all around for them.
Finally, here comes Marie-France Dubreil/Michael Weiss… and Fatima (was she the same choreographer that telegraphed the moves for Elena and David earlier? I dunno, but they spend enough time showing how this number came together off the ice that I’m expecting Lysacek to wander in from the DWTS set, saying “Uh, Mike, I’ve already got this studio booked for the next 3 hours”… So their music is the Black-Eyed Peas’ “Meet Me Halfway”, and Good God, something terrible has happened to BOTH of their lustrous heads of hair. I think a can of sculpting gel took their dressing room hostage. Oh, were they skating? Yeah, it was pretty good….got a lift or two managed, and she stayed out of the way while he did his back flip AGAIN (he did one in the opening of the show too). Skating last served them well… it would appear these judges were indeed saving room! 9-10-9 from them.
The score totals: Dubreil/Weiss have 28, Bourne/Zimmerman have 27, Sale/Lauzon have 26, Arakawa/Lambiel have 24, and Berezhnaya/Pelletier have 22. BUT now we’re supposed to go vote, vote, VOTE for our faves so they can have a winner for the people by Sunday’s show.
And as we’ve been hearing all week, Joannie Rochette closed out the evening with her ISU-approved performance of “Fly”. And a standing O from the crowd & judges. And hugs all around. Nice way to end the show.
Except for when Browning presented the cast at the end by saying “These are your Thin Ice skaters…” and I couldn’t help but hear it as if he was following it with a wave to a whole other group with the words “And THESE are your fat ice skaters…. Vote now!”
Sometimes I have no choice but to amuse my own bad self.
(P.S… if you want to catch the 2nd part of Thin Ice it’s on 7PM Eastern this Sunday.)
Skaters on "Thin Ice", Evan Explains His Diabolic Schedule on "Bonnie Hunt"
NOW I get why ABC is running Thin Ice this weekend.
It’s why the 2006 4CCs was on at the same time as the Super Bowl. It’s why ESPN used to run its Grand Prix coverage on Monday nights while ESPN-owned ABC aired Monday Night Football. The NCAA tournament is on CBS for the next few days… it’s counter-programming, baby! No one wants to watch both at the same time! (Except maybe… me? Hey, I called some of the evening’s biggest NCAA upsets Thursday night! But I’ll manage…)
Anyway… THIN ICE, on ABC Friday night @ 8PM Eastern. Kurt Browning is co-hosting, and Tweeted this tonight:
This will be great, tomorrow night on ABC a competition called Thin Ice will be really fun for skating fans. Do not expect the normal.
I’ll post more about it after it airs.
Remember when I posted about Johnny Weir turning up at The Bonnie Hunt Show a couple weeks ago? Apparently it was the start of a trend…
+ Earlier this week, Brian Boitano went to visit Bonnie to promote Season 2 of What Would Brian Boitano Make?, demonstrate pizza-making with Bonnie… and participate in a whole lotta hilarious innuendo and double entendres when Bonnie acted instantly tipsy with a cocktail he made her. Funniest moment for me: when Boitano, after kind of playing dumb about the innuendo for a while, started talking to Bonnie while “handling” his rolling pin in, shall we say, a special way(!!). Quite the riot.
+ Then on Thursday’s show came “golden boy” Evan Lysacek. It was pretty priceless (Evan seemed a little nervous and a little cool at the same time; viewers posting about his appearance were prone to calling him ADORABLE)… so I’ll just list some of the highlights (though as with Weir’s and probably Boitano’s appearances, you can probably see the clip at the Bonnie Hunt Show website…)
--Talks about passing the gold medal around at parties and getting champagne on it
-- Talks about Plushy…still very classy about it all, saying he can’t imagine how hard it’d be to focus for an entire year on coming back JUST to get another gold, and then not getting it… hopes he’ll soon be able to see what an achievement coming back for silver was… luckily no one discussed either one’s hair this time…(Evan’s was looking fairly normal on the show; not over-slicked as in competition and not…um… whatever they did to it when he did Leno’s show pre-Olympics
--Talks about his stress fracture and how it related to his decision not to quad…
--Dancing with The Stars and how everyone said it would be easy for him as a skater, but it isn’t…
-- RE: His schedule this spring…He’ll be in L.A. Mon/Tues and with SOI the rest of the week…”Yeah, I know… “ he says as Bonnie & audience gasp. He insists he wasn’t too worried about the schedule insanity…until he saw how many red-eye flights it’ll require. Then he said “OK, so I’ll just work everyday without sleep! I can do that!” So, um… we’ll see how this goes. With all the injuries incurred by DWTS vets, could his stress fracture be re-agggravated?
-- He describes his partner Anna as a “red-headed Ruskie”… as I figured, she’ll be on the road with him training his dances…
--Talks about his mom not being able to watch him skate live, and the room Procter & Gamble set up for her to watch him in Vancouver
--Talks about his doing things 3 times, to “trick all his senses” into knowing it’s competition time (putting on costume, skates, etc.)
--Bonnie gave him a prop can of “use it or lose it” spray tan they played with for a while… she took note of the HUGE ring he apparently got from his parents as a b-day gift…
--Then he took the spray can and put some on his arms “for a little glow”…
--Offhandedly, as she sets up a family photo of his she’s about to show, says “you’re pretty cute” to Evan… to the delight of a semi-squealing audience (I think they were a little too old on average to squeal like teenagers)…
-- Evan smiles and almost just as offhandedly says “I love you” to Bonnie…
-- After the pic talk comes her asking if he’s dating anyone… then she backpedals saying “should I not ask that?”
--“You can ask whatever you want… ‘I don’t have to answer it…” he replies. “Well, I feel like you’re flirting with me and I want to know if you’re on the market” (audience freaks again)…
-- “I am flirting w/you, correct… and on the market, correct… correct on all counts…” (Gotta wonder what happened with Nastia Liukin, then... ah, but I digress…)
-- Then she “lets him know she’s willing to take her nightie off three times”… have I mentioned she’s literally twice as old as him, and she does stuff like this all the time on the show? (It comes out of her self-deprecating style of humor and, I suppose, the concept that none of her guest would ever seriously consider her for a date.)
-- Nonetheless, he makes sure she knows that he knows the Viennese Waltz now... “So I’m not messing around,” he assures.
OK, so THAT’s cleared up!
Here’s the little clip of his DWTS rehearsal that’s making the rounds… Clip of the Day!
It’s why the 2006 4CCs was on at the same time as the Super Bowl. It’s why ESPN used to run its Grand Prix coverage on Monday nights while ESPN-owned ABC aired Monday Night Football. The NCAA tournament is on CBS for the next few days… it’s counter-programming, baby! No one wants to watch both at the same time! (Except maybe… me? Hey, I called some of the evening’s biggest NCAA upsets Thursday night! But I’ll manage…)
Anyway… THIN ICE, on ABC Friday night @ 8PM Eastern. Kurt Browning is co-hosting, and Tweeted this tonight:
This will be great, tomorrow night on ABC a competition called Thin Ice will be really fun for skating fans. Do not expect the normal.
I’ll post more about it after it airs.
Remember when I posted about Johnny Weir turning up at The Bonnie Hunt Show a couple weeks ago? Apparently it was the start of a trend…
+ Earlier this week, Brian Boitano went to visit Bonnie to promote Season 2 of What Would Brian Boitano Make?, demonstrate pizza-making with Bonnie… and participate in a whole lotta hilarious innuendo and double entendres when Bonnie acted instantly tipsy with a cocktail he made her. Funniest moment for me: when Boitano, after kind of playing dumb about the innuendo for a while, started talking to Bonnie while “handling” his rolling pin in, shall we say, a special way(!!). Quite the riot.
+ Then on Thursday’s show came “golden boy” Evan Lysacek. It was pretty priceless (Evan seemed a little nervous and a little cool at the same time; viewers posting about his appearance were prone to calling him ADORABLE)… so I’ll just list some of the highlights (though as with Weir’s and probably Boitano’s appearances, you can probably see the clip at the Bonnie Hunt Show website…)
--Talks about passing the gold medal around at parties and getting champagne on it
-- Talks about Plushy…still very classy about it all, saying he can’t imagine how hard it’d be to focus for an entire year on coming back JUST to get another gold, and then not getting it… hopes he’ll soon be able to see what an achievement coming back for silver was… luckily no one discussed either one’s hair this time…(Evan’s was looking fairly normal on the show; not over-slicked as in competition and not…um… whatever they did to it when he did Leno’s show pre-Olympics
--Talks about his stress fracture and how it related to his decision not to quad…
--Dancing with The Stars and how everyone said it would be easy for him as a skater, but it isn’t…
-- RE: His schedule this spring…He’ll be in L.A. Mon/Tues and with SOI the rest of the week…”Yeah, I know… “ he says as Bonnie & audience gasp. He insists he wasn’t too worried about the schedule insanity…until he saw how many red-eye flights it’ll require. Then he said “OK, so I’ll just work everyday without sleep! I can do that!” So, um… we’ll see how this goes. With all the injuries incurred by DWTS vets, could his stress fracture be re-agggravated?
-- He describes his partner Anna as a “red-headed Ruskie”… as I figured, she’ll be on the road with him training his dances…
--Talks about his mom not being able to watch him skate live, and the room Procter & Gamble set up for her to watch him in Vancouver
--Talks about his doing things 3 times, to “trick all his senses” into knowing it’s competition time (putting on costume, skates, etc.)
--Bonnie gave him a prop can of “use it or lose it” spray tan they played with for a while… she took note of the HUGE ring he apparently got from his parents as a b-day gift…
--Then he took the spray can and put some on his arms “for a little glow”…
--Offhandedly, as she sets up a family photo of his she’s about to show, says “you’re pretty cute” to Evan… to the delight of a semi-squealing audience (I think they were a little too old on average to squeal like teenagers)…
-- Evan smiles and almost just as offhandedly says “I love you” to Bonnie…
-- After the pic talk comes her asking if he’s dating anyone… then she backpedals saying “should I not ask that?”
--“You can ask whatever you want… ‘I don’t have to answer it…” he replies. “Well, I feel like you’re flirting with me and I want to know if you’re on the market” (audience freaks again)…
-- “I am flirting w/you, correct… and on the market, correct… correct on all counts…” (Gotta wonder what happened with Nastia Liukin, then... ah, but I digress…)
-- Then she “lets him know she’s willing to take her nightie off three times”… have I mentioned she’s literally twice as old as him, and she does stuff like this all the time on the show? (It comes out of her self-deprecating style of humor and, I suppose, the concept that none of her guest would ever seriously consider her for a date.)
-- Nonetheless, he makes sure she knows that he knows the Viennese Waltz now... “So I’m not messing around,” he assures.
OK, so THAT’s cleared up!
Here’s the little clip of his DWTS rehearsal that’s making the rounds… Clip of the Day!
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
Post-Olympic Grad Skating School is in Session... Pairs Free Skate Group 1 is Up
I’m going to take advantage of this tiny lull before Worlds gets underway (and my unabashedly lousy predictions are attempted) to try a round of that POGSS I mentioned last week.
No, POGSS is not a trendy Irish beer… um, at least I don’t think so. It’s an acronym I made up for Post-Olympic Grad Skating School.
Today, I’ll be sharing some notes I made when watching back the first group of pairs from their Vancouver free skate. I tried to note something about every pair I saw, but I apologize in advance if that doesn’t happen… to be honest, some are a lot more memorable than others. In good ways and bad ways!
Let me know if you took a look at/had thoughts on any of these…
Maylin Hausch/Daniel Wende, Germany
Ages 21/25… FINISHED 17th in Vancouver
I thought they were Denney/Barrett (of the US) at first glance, but then I said to myself “Jeremy Bennett wouldn’t wear something that goofy-looking.” Unfortunately, their costumes seem to have upstaged their skating for me… I have no other notes on them.
Ekaterina Kostenko/Roman Talan, Ukraine
Ages 25/22… FINISHED 20th in Vancouver
They skated to Moonlight Sonata… slow, blah, and had a terrible death spiral.
Maria Sergejeva/Ilia Glebov, Estonia
Ages 17/22… FINISHED 19th in Vancouver
They used West Side Story and it was CRYING for better choreography. But these kids are pretty young; I think they were just given the music mighty early in their career… they seemed to get a little more energy in the back end of the performance; always a good thing. Had a pretty nice 1-armed star lift (?) near the end. Seemed to finish several seconds early… do the judges have a penalty for THAT yet?
Joanna Sulej/Mateusz Chruscinski, Poland
Ages 20/22… FINISHED 18th in Vancouver
They skated to Romeo & Juliet… a couple nice moments; he had a freak little fall near the end.
Stacey Kemp/David King, UK
Ages 21/25… FINISHED 16th in Vancouver
Speaking of Poland…I knew their coaches looked familiar—apparently Kemp/King work with the Siudeks (former Polish pairs champs and 1999 World Bronze Medalists) Kemp/King had an interesting contrast of good/bad skills… surprisingly good lifts (until you realize who their coaches are—the Siudeks had some of the best lifts in the business!), and an exceptional level 4 forward inside death spiral. But their side-by-sides are sorely lacking… double flip and flip combos were all they had, and even those weren’t that good (Stacey’s jump technique seemed especially off).
Of course the Olympic performances are tough if not impossible to track down outside of the NBC site… but here is Kemp/King’s SP performance from Euros as the Clip of the Day. Unfortunately it showcases yet another trouble with the side-by-sides when King falters badly on their SBS spin. But the rest is pretty nice, so it’ll be interesting to see if they can get their singles skating skills on par with the rest of their work.
No, POGSS is not a trendy Irish beer… um, at least I don’t think so. It’s an acronym I made up for Post-Olympic Grad Skating School.
Today, I’ll be sharing some notes I made when watching back the first group of pairs from their Vancouver free skate. I tried to note something about every pair I saw, but I apologize in advance if that doesn’t happen… to be honest, some are a lot more memorable than others. In good ways and bad ways!
Let me know if you took a look at/had thoughts on any of these…
Maylin Hausch/Daniel Wende, Germany
Ages 21/25… FINISHED 17th in Vancouver
I thought they were Denney/Barrett (of the US) at first glance, but then I said to myself “Jeremy Bennett wouldn’t wear something that goofy-looking.” Unfortunately, their costumes seem to have upstaged their skating for me… I have no other notes on them.
Ekaterina Kostenko/Roman Talan, Ukraine
Ages 25/22… FINISHED 20th in Vancouver
They skated to Moonlight Sonata… slow, blah, and had a terrible death spiral.
Maria Sergejeva/Ilia Glebov, Estonia
Ages 17/22… FINISHED 19th in Vancouver
They used West Side Story and it was CRYING for better choreography. But these kids are pretty young; I think they were just given the music mighty early in their career… they seemed to get a little more energy in the back end of the performance; always a good thing. Had a pretty nice 1-armed star lift (?) near the end. Seemed to finish several seconds early… do the judges have a penalty for THAT yet?
Joanna Sulej/Mateusz Chruscinski, Poland
Ages 20/22… FINISHED 18th in Vancouver
They skated to Romeo & Juliet… a couple nice moments; he had a freak little fall near the end.
Stacey Kemp/David King, UK
Ages 21/25… FINISHED 16th in Vancouver
Speaking of Poland…I knew their coaches looked familiar—apparently Kemp/King work with the Siudeks (former Polish pairs champs and 1999 World Bronze Medalists) Kemp/King had an interesting contrast of good/bad skills… surprisingly good lifts (until you realize who their coaches are—the Siudeks had some of the best lifts in the business!), and an exceptional level 4 forward inside death spiral. But their side-by-sides are sorely lacking… double flip and flip combos were all they had, and even those weren’t that good (Stacey’s jump technique seemed especially off).
Of course the Olympic performances are tough if not impossible to track down outside of the NBC site… but here is Kemp/King’s SP performance from Euros as the Clip of the Day. Unfortunately it showcases yet another trouble with the side-by-sides when King falters badly on their SBS spin. But the rest is pretty nice, so it’ll be interesting to see if they can get their singles skating skills on par with the rest of their work.
Monday, March 15, 2010
Don't Sweat It, Rochette... The ISU Clearly Doesn't Appreciate You Anyway.
UPDATE: Apprarently the ISU has, as of this afternoon, changed their tune on the matter I wrote about below... and Rochette will be allowed to skate on the ABC program after all. I just read that on IceNetwork's home page, anyway.
So to that, I say Better late than never, ISU. Thank you for your change of heart.
(But if you still feel like reading my rip on their previous decision, be my guest...)
In this corner… is Joannie Rochette and her recent decision to sit out Worlds this year—something I think many of us could see coming once the reality of her mom’s passing sunk in a little.
In this corner…is the ISU. According to this article by Philip Hersh, the ISU is putting the screws to Ms. Rochette because she’s not only withdrawing from next week’s Worlds, but planning to skate a tribute to her mother during the ABC 2-day reality series Thin Ice. Or should I say WAS planning.
And over here, in my corner, I’m going to do a little thing called SERIOUSLY?!
(Which may bear more than a passing resemblance to a recurring bit they do on Saturday Night Live called “REALLY?!?”)
It goes like this:
SERIOUSLY, ISU?! You’re going to decide now’s the time to flex your big powerful sanctioning muscles, and kick a young woman when she’s down? I mean, seriously…
So you’re pissed off, ISU. I get that. Like so many other post-Olympic Worlds, you’re going to be missing several of your Olympic headliners. No Lysacek. No Weir. No Shen & Zhao. No Lambiel. No Belbin; no Agosto. And now, no Rochette either… and the week is still young, right?
And you’re probably pissed at ABC for being the home of Dancing with the Stars, and Thin Ice, and this new Skating with the Stars thing if it gets off the ground… because, God forbid, someone else make money off of top-flight skaters besides the all-mighty ISU. Seriously!
So this is what you do… seriously?! You wave sanctions and threats in Skate Canada’s face? You take out your frustrations on your new Olympic Bronze Medalist… someone who couldn’t possibly be expected under the circumstances to compete in Worlds anyway?
Someone who had to suffer the biggest emotional earthquake there is, then wore her personal heartache for 22.5 million to see as she channeled deep and did some of her best work ever? Over twenty-two million viewers; a number that could’ve been considerably lower if not for her misfortune.
I mean, seriously… all we kept hearing in the weeks before Vancouver was the disappointment of American ladies this, and the no-ladies-medalist-since-Manley that. Of course, no mere mortal would wish for something so profoundly sad to befall an athlete at the Olympics. But it happened… and she was North American… and like it or not, her terrible loss was NBC’s and CTV’s gain. And yours too, ISU.
But I’m sure that makes the ISU uncomfortable, so please, by all means, let’s not talk about the good she’s already done for skating and/or the Olympics. Let’s focus instead on the 3 ½ minute exhibition piece she wanted to skate in a show that happens to come a few scant days ahead of Worlds. Let’s look at that as Joannie Cashing In, rather than putting herself through one more week of competition when she’s emotionally spent and physically undertrained. No, seriously, ISU… let’s do that! Let’s make Rochette the villain! Just like you tried to do with Kim Yu-Na a couple months ago, when you threatened South Korea with sanctions and fines if they didn’t “persuade” Kim to gum up her pre-Olympic training regimen and hi-tail it over to the homeland for a pre-Olympic showdown with Mao Asada that was about as necessary as reading the directions on a public restroom hand dryer. Thank goodness South Korea scoffed at your strong-arming tactics there. How I wish Rochette and Skate Canada would do the same in this case. Seriously.
Ya know, ISU, I’d so love to think that as a collective unit you’d learned something over the past 8 years. You’ve struggled (and I mean that loosely) through scandal, the efforts of the World Skating Federation, declining revenues, a rights agreement that’s hardly worth the paper it’s written on anymore, a new scoring system that remains the target of endless ridicule… you’d think you’d be thrilled that so many skaters put down brilliant performances in Vancouver in spite of all of this. You’d think the bump in learn-to-skate classes that’s sure to happen over the next year or so…and the ripple effect they’re likely to create over time… you’d think that would be enough, ISU, for you to realize the acute uniqueness of Rochette’s circumstances, and look the other way this time… and welcome her back into the fold next season, if in fact Rochette even chooses to keep her all-important “Olympic Eligibility” after all this nonsense.
You’d think so, but so far… not a chance.
Seriously, ISU? You’re doing the wrong thing. Again.
So to that, I say Better late than never, ISU. Thank you for your change of heart.
(But if you still feel like reading my rip on their previous decision, be my guest...)
In this corner… is Joannie Rochette and her recent decision to sit out Worlds this year—something I think many of us could see coming once the reality of her mom’s passing sunk in a little.
In this corner…is the ISU. According to this article by Philip Hersh, the ISU is putting the screws to Ms. Rochette because she’s not only withdrawing from next week’s Worlds, but planning to skate a tribute to her mother during the ABC 2-day reality series Thin Ice. Or should I say WAS planning.
And over here, in my corner, I’m going to do a little thing called SERIOUSLY?!
(Which may bear more than a passing resemblance to a recurring bit they do on Saturday Night Live called “REALLY?!?”)
It goes like this:
SERIOUSLY, ISU?! You’re going to decide now’s the time to flex your big powerful sanctioning muscles, and kick a young woman when she’s down? I mean, seriously…
So you’re pissed off, ISU. I get that. Like so many other post-Olympic Worlds, you’re going to be missing several of your Olympic headliners. No Lysacek. No Weir. No Shen & Zhao. No Lambiel. No Belbin; no Agosto. And now, no Rochette either… and the week is still young, right?
And you’re probably pissed at ABC for being the home of Dancing with the Stars, and Thin Ice, and this new Skating with the Stars thing if it gets off the ground… because, God forbid, someone else make money off of top-flight skaters besides the all-mighty ISU. Seriously!
So this is what you do… seriously?! You wave sanctions and threats in Skate Canada’s face? You take out your frustrations on your new Olympic Bronze Medalist… someone who couldn’t possibly be expected under the circumstances to compete in Worlds anyway?
Someone who had to suffer the biggest emotional earthquake there is, then wore her personal heartache for 22.5 million to see as she channeled deep and did some of her best work ever? Over twenty-two million viewers; a number that could’ve been considerably lower if not for her misfortune.
I mean, seriously… all we kept hearing in the weeks before Vancouver was the disappointment of American ladies this, and the no-ladies-medalist-since-Manley that. Of course, no mere mortal would wish for something so profoundly sad to befall an athlete at the Olympics. But it happened… and she was North American… and like it or not, her terrible loss was NBC’s and CTV’s gain. And yours too, ISU.
But I’m sure that makes the ISU uncomfortable, so please, by all means, let’s not talk about the good she’s already done for skating and/or the Olympics. Let’s focus instead on the 3 ½ minute exhibition piece she wanted to skate in a show that happens to come a few scant days ahead of Worlds. Let’s look at that as Joannie Cashing In, rather than putting herself through one more week of competition when she’s emotionally spent and physically undertrained. No, seriously, ISU… let’s do that! Let’s make Rochette the villain! Just like you tried to do with Kim Yu-Na a couple months ago, when you threatened South Korea with sanctions and fines if they didn’t “persuade” Kim to gum up her pre-Olympic training regimen and hi-tail it over to the homeland for a pre-Olympic showdown with Mao Asada that was about as necessary as reading the directions on a public restroom hand dryer. Thank goodness South Korea scoffed at your strong-arming tactics there. How I wish Rochette and Skate Canada would do the same in this case. Seriously.
Ya know, ISU, I’d so love to think that as a collective unit you’d learned something over the past 8 years. You’ve struggled (and I mean that loosely) through scandal, the efforts of the World Skating Federation, declining revenues, a rights agreement that’s hardly worth the paper it’s written on anymore, a new scoring system that remains the target of endless ridicule… you’d think you’d be thrilled that so many skaters put down brilliant performances in Vancouver in spite of all of this. You’d think the bump in learn-to-skate classes that’s sure to happen over the next year or so…and the ripple effect they’re likely to create over time… you’d think that would be enough, ISU, for you to realize the acute uniqueness of Rochette’s circumstances, and look the other way this time… and welcome her back into the fold next season, if in fact Rochette even chooses to keep her all-important “Olympic Eligibility” after all this nonsense.
You’d think so, but so far… not a chance.
Seriously, ISU? You’re doing the wrong thing. Again.
Saturday, March 13, 2010
One Worlds Down, One Worlds to Go...
Not that one had absolutely anything to do with the other, but I’m kind of jazzed that the skater I featured yesterday—Agnes Zawadzki—surged from 8th place to capture the silver medal at Jr. Worlds earlier today, Her medal turned out to be the only one earned by the entire U.S. team at this event, so… between this success, and her U.S. Junior Nationals title, I think this would be a good time for the Ice Network to get a bio posted already on Ms. Zawadzki. Don’t you?
Final results on the ladies:
GOLD-- Kanako MURAKAMI, Japan
SILVER-- Agnes ZAWADZKI, USA
BRONZE-- Polina AGAFONOVA, Russia
Canada’s Kate CHARBONNEAU finished in 6th, while the other U.S. competitors (Kiri BAGA and Christina GAO) were 7th and 8th, respectively.
With this Worlds now in the books, and that Worlds (the Senior version) starting up in about 10 days… plus the weekly adventures of Lysacek, the daily adventures of Weir, and all the other quasi-retirements, coaching changes, and pairs/dance breakups bound to be announced over the next month or two… whew… does it seem like so much of the Olympic experience is slipping away already?
Well I think I have a remedy for that. POST-OLYMPICS GRAD SKATING SCHOOL (POGSS) will be in the headline from now on when I dip back into the Vancouver well, whether it’s to analyze the early groups of skaters that never had a chance of being seen on TV, or look at those that did from a different perspective… or post more highlights from Universal’s Figure Skating Review/Preview Show (haven’t forgotten about it!)…
Because if it takes four years to generate this kind of excitement about the sport, I tend to think we should milk it to the last drop!
Some Jr. Worlds clips are starting to find their way onto You Tube now… this gold-medal winner from Yuzuru Hanyu is today’s Clip of the Day. (And sorry to bring up his name yet again, but does anyone else see a little Johnny Weir influence on Hanyu’s style?)
Final results on the ladies:
GOLD-- Kanako MURAKAMI, Japan
SILVER-- Agnes ZAWADZKI, USA
BRONZE-- Polina AGAFONOVA, Russia
Canada’s Kate CHARBONNEAU finished in 6th, while the other U.S. competitors (Kiri BAGA and Christina GAO) were 7th and 8th, respectively.
With this Worlds now in the books, and that Worlds (the Senior version) starting up in about 10 days… plus the weekly adventures of Lysacek, the daily adventures of Weir, and all the other quasi-retirements, coaching changes, and pairs/dance breakups bound to be announced over the next month or two… whew… does it seem like so much of the Olympic experience is slipping away already?
Well I think I have a remedy for that. POST-OLYMPICS GRAD SKATING SCHOOL (POGSS) will be in the headline from now on when I dip back into the Vancouver well, whether it’s to analyze the early groups of skaters that never had a chance of being seen on TV, or look at those that did from a different perspective… or post more highlights from Universal’s Figure Skating Review/Preview Show (haven’t forgotten about it!)…
Because if it takes four years to generate this kind of excitement about the sport, I tend to think we should milk it to the last drop!
Some Jr. Worlds clips are starting to find their way onto You Tube now… this gold-medal winner from Yuzuru Hanyu is today’s Clip of the Day. (And sorry to bring up his name yet again, but does anyone else see a little Johnny Weir influence on Hanyu’s style?)
Friday, March 12, 2010
One Place Johnny Weir May NOT be this Spring: Stars On Ice....??
I suppose this first bit will be a lot weirder if Stars on Ice happens to be advertising in that little space you see alongside the text as you read this…
These days it seems that Johnny Weir is in the news as much, if not more, than any other figure skating medalist from Vancouver. Admittedly, he has not instigated as much of this press as one might think…and assuming the contents of this article are true (I say that only because it’s a pretty serious accusation, and in my moments of naiveté I’m hoping it’s all a Big Misunderstanding), he’s certainly not to blame:
GLAAD (Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation) has learned from a source that wishes to remain anonymous that sponsors of the Stars on Ice Tour, which include Smuckers and IMG Entertainment, have refused to allow 3-time US National Champion and 2-time Olympian Johnny Weir to participate because they claim that he is “not family friendly.”
To say that Weir is “not family friendly” would be a clear jab at his perceived sexual orientation.
This raises so many more questions for me than it answers, but I’ll wait to see how this unfolds before asking them.
Jr. Worlds Update: The medals for Ice Dance were as follows:
GOLD-- Elena ILINYKH / Nikita KATSALAPOV (Russia)
SILVER-- Alexandra PAUL / Mitchell ISLAM (Canada)
BRONZE-- Ksenia MONKO / Kirill KHALIAVIN (Russia)
With this kind of finish, it would seem that both the once and future (or I guess that’s “present”) kings of ice dance are keeping pace nicely. Among the U.S. teams: Maia SHIBUTANI / Alex SHIBUTANI finished 4th, Rachel TIBBETTS / Collin BRUBAKER stayed in 7th, and Piper GILLES / Zachary DONOHUE ended the event in 9th.
And a tight battle between Russia and Japan has emerged after the Ladies’ SP …Anna OVCHAROVA currently leads Kanako MURAKAMI by less than a point, with another Russian (Polina AGAFONOVA) about 2 ½ points back from there. If you’re wondering about the absence of U.S. ladies from that mix, remember that our original Top Contender (Ashley Wagner) withdrew from the event a couple weeks ago…
But her replacement, Kiri BAGA, is currently in 5th… Agnes ZAWADZKI (1st in Junior Nationals this year) is in 8th… and Christina GAO (5th in Senior Nationals this year) is 9th. We’ll see what happens tomorrow!
Of those last three names the one I was least familiar with was Zawadzki’s, so I looked her up on You Tube… and am posting her only video (for now) as the Clip of the Day, which was taken from last summer’s DuPage Open. The girl’s got some flair, for sure… and I don’t think that’s just because she and Alena Leonova apparently enjoy the same Broadway shows :-)
These days it seems that Johnny Weir is in the news as much, if not more, than any other figure skating medalist from Vancouver. Admittedly, he has not instigated as much of this press as one might think…and assuming the contents of this article are true (I say that only because it’s a pretty serious accusation, and in my moments of naiveté I’m hoping it’s all a Big Misunderstanding), he’s certainly not to blame:
GLAAD (Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation) has learned from a source that wishes to remain anonymous that sponsors of the Stars on Ice Tour, which include Smuckers and IMG Entertainment, have refused to allow 3-time US National Champion and 2-time Olympian Johnny Weir to participate because they claim that he is “not family friendly.”
To say that Weir is “not family friendly” would be a clear jab at his perceived sexual orientation.
This raises so many more questions for me than it answers, but I’ll wait to see how this unfolds before asking them.
Jr. Worlds Update: The medals for Ice Dance were as follows:
GOLD-- Elena ILINYKH / Nikita KATSALAPOV (Russia)
SILVER-- Alexandra PAUL / Mitchell ISLAM (Canada)
BRONZE-- Ksenia MONKO / Kirill KHALIAVIN (Russia)
With this kind of finish, it would seem that both the once and future (or I guess that’s “present”) kings of ice dance are keeping pace nicely. Among the U.S. teams: Maia SHIBUTANI / Alex SHIBUTANI finished 4th, Rachel TIBBETTS / Collin BRUBAKER stayed in 7th, and Piper GILLES / Zachary DONOHUE ended the event in 9th.
And a tight battle between Russia and Japan has emerged after the Ladies’ SP …Anna OVCHAROVA currently leads Kanako MURAKAMI by less than a point, with another Russian (Polina AGAFONOVA) about 2 ½ points back from there. If you’re wondering about the absence of U.S. ladies from that mix, remember that our original Top Contender (Ashley Wagner) withdrew from the event a couple weeks ago…
But her replacement, Kiri BAGA, is currently in 5th… Agnes ZAWADZKI (1st in Junior Nationals this year) is in 8th… and Christina GAO (5th in Senior Nationals this year) is 9th. We’ll see what happens tomorrow!
Of those last three names the one I was least familiar with was Zawadzki’s, so I looked her up on You Tube… and am posting her only video (for now) as the Clip of the Day, which was taken from last summer’s DuPage Open. The girl’s got some flair, for sure… and I don’t think that’s just because she and Alena Leonova apparently enjoy the same Broadway shows :-)
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