The competition is heating up on Dancing With the Stars, and this season is proving that you have to deliver the personality and the dance skills — it’s not enough to ride to the finals on personality alone.
Week 3 brought the usual sob-fest of “Most Memorable Year” night, where the celebrities pick the year that means the most to them based on events in their lives. A few stars shined out there on the dance floor, but for Mischa Barton, the week brought more challenges for the former TheO.C. actress.
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She and dance pro Artem Chigvintsev have not had a natural partnership or friendship all season long. In the package that aired before her dance, the clip showed her criticizing the dancer after they left the dance floor in Week 2.
“I was relying on you to make it a positive experience,” she chided Chigvintsev.
“You were already in the zone of not wanting to do this,” he replied. “That’s my honest opinion.”
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This quitter attitude seems to have not only infected her entire season of DWTS, but her entire career. It’s sad to watch Barton tell herself she can’t when she has already had tremendous success.
In fact, she described herself as an “instinctual, reactive person” and The O.C. “machine” and her time in the spotlight on a very hot show became too much. She left the The CW show in 2006 in a spectacular fashion — the writers had her character killed off in a car accident.
“I went back to England [in 2008] and it was a year of self-exploration,” she admitted.
What she left out of the DWTS interview was the fact that her personal life was also spinning out of control. Barton was arrested for a DUI and driving without a valid license in 2007.
The former teen star tried to turn around her attitude on this dance floor this week. While she managed a smile and a bit of spark, Barton was the second contestant voted off Season 22.
While Barton stumbled, model Nyle DiMarco shined. He is proving that his disability is not stopping him from dancing with rhythm and freedom of movement. He and partner Peta Murgatroyd’s Tango traveled across the ballroom just like 2012 global trip he was commemorating through dance.
TV viewers also watched Mark Ballas and UFC fighter Paige VanZant battle it out in the ring with a modernized Paso Doble. While the drama appeared to be on the dance floor, the fans held their breaths over Ballas’ back injury, which prevented him from dancing last week.
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The other superstar continues to be Boyz II Men’s Wayna Morris, who has proven that all dance styles work well for him so far. He and partner Lindsay Arnold gracefully waltzed to an a capella version of “The Star-Spangled Banner” by the boy band. The ease at which these two glide across the dance floor is hard to match.
On the other side of the spectrum, it’s starting to look like fans are losing interest in former NFL star Doug Flutie. Even though his emotional waltz dedicated to his deceased parents had the audience in tears, he might be the first athlete to exit next week since he and Karina Smirnoff were back at the bottom of the scoreboard and viewer votes again this week.
There are also several talented dancers who are stuck in the middle of the pack just begging for a major breakthrough. Good Morning America meteorologist Ginger Zee, Pittsburgh Steeler Von Miller and former Broadway star Marla Maples are the three to keep your eye on. They all have the goods; now they just need to make a bigger leap on the scoreboard.
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