“I’m really nervous tonight,” says pro Mark Ballas, moments before going on stage to do a knockout “Eye Of The Tiger” paso doble with the one
Dancing With the Stars celebrity viewers voted to bring back, Cheetah Girl Sabrina Bryan. “Because I’m not just dancing,” he explains, holding his arms up as if he were doing a slow waltz. Then he puts up his fists. “I’m DANCING.”
It was a night of high drama from start to finish, with the electrifying re-pairing of Ballas and Bryan, the double shot of adrenaline supplied by Michael Buble, who sang live, and the elimination of pop star Aaron Carter, possibly the most emotional contestant ever to samba out the door. Tears streamed down his face as he walked the press line after the show.
“I didn’t want this to come to an end,” he says, clinging to his pro partner, Karina Smirnoff. “I wanted to keep showing everybody what I got.”
For Carter, this show was a turning point, a sort of rebirth. At 21, Carter has gone through more professional ups and downs than most people twice his age. “Karina changed my life,” he says. “She gave me back what I wanted back so bad, which is to be a performer and to be doing this again. And it was really hard, you know? I went through my parents divorcing and I couldn’t do what I loved.” He turns to Smirnoff. “You’ve given me the chance to do that again.”
Meanwhile, Buble works the room like the love god, seducing everyone in his path. “You’re so sweet. You’re so sexy. What are you trying to do to me?” he asks, after this reporter asks him if the pro dancers have inspired him to dance as well as sing. Then he gets serious. “I used to do Broadway and a lot of musical theater, so I had to do all the lessons for the swing and the Lindy and the ballroom. I wasn’t the best at it.” Then he spies pro Cheryl Burke. “You are one sexy woman,” he tells her.
But back to Ballas and Bryan, who are doing a postmortem on their performance. Was it awkward, dancing again with the partner who became her boyfriend (now ex-boyfriend) after appearing on the show two years ago? “No,” says Bryan, “because I’ve been doing a lot of backstage stuff so we’ve kind of seen each other around over the season, so it’s been fine. Once Mark and I start dancing, we can’t stop laughing. So it was never really awkward at all.”
Ballas is over the moon about her performance. “You murdered it,” he tells her, as the highest of praise. “That was my favorite paso,
ever. I give you three ’11’s.’”