Strictly: Week Ten

This may be a slightly condensed review. One of my darling cats decided to disappear in the cold and snow for the best part of a day, and to be perfectly honest I wasn’t really in the mood to take notes under the circumstances. The little blighter re-appeared on the stroke of midnight, having kept us fretting all day, and if it wasn’t for Strictly providing a small window of light relief I may have been even more of an emotional wreck than I was.

I quite like the idea of a ‘movie’ themed night; although I did wonder if this might mean shoehorning ideas into dances that didn’t quite go. Take Scott Maslen and his 007-look Paso Doble. I wanted to like this more than I actually did. It was certainly powerful, and yes it was dramatic, and he danced it with passion and intent. But to be honest, there didn’t seem to be much magic about it. When I look back on the brilliant Paso’s, such as Austin’s or Ramps’, they both seemed to maintain that Spanish machismo that was sadly washed away by the famous James Bond theme, and I’m afraid that no amount of foot stomping and gratuitous tearing of shirts will make up for it. I’m not anti tearing shirts, for the record (depending who is wearing it). Natalie’s attempts at Ursula Andress somehow only managed to look rather cheap, like a budget Honey Ryder. Not that I want people thinking I’m Mary Whitehouse reincarnate, but I’m not sure that the nearly naked look works for a Paso. It certainly works for Bond, but then you have that juxtaposition I referred to earlier where both elements result in something not entirely appropriate.

Still, Scott did so much better than last week. All the steps appeared to be occur without much mishap but I personally found his total of 35 to be, once again, a little too high...

Anne Widdecombe must have been dreaming of a 35 total. I think it’s been a while since Anton saw one as well! It was interesting to see how, over the last week, people close to the show are now subtly but surely beginning to reach for the knives where team Widdebec are concerned. Now, at the quarter final stages, there seems to be a genuine feeling that it should be the dancers that make it to the final rather than the, shall we say, ‘novelty acts’. Anne’s chief problem was that her American Smooth contained nothing that was (deliberately) amusing. The lifts were genuinely impressive; I’d feared for Anton’s T7 and 8 vertebrae earlier in the week and had wondered if perhaps the idea of dancing the semi’s in a wheelchair might be their latest gimmick! Lifts apart, there wasn’t very much that was genuinely smooth about it, but thankfully they stopped short of following Scott’s lead and ripping Anton’s shirt open...

Alesha was surprisingly blunt to Anne. She didn’t quite say “sling yer’ bleedin’ hook” but it wasn’t far short of it.

I wasn’t very keen on Matt’s Austin Powers jive. By its nature a jive should never be dorky, goofy and be composed entirely of ‘schwinnnnnng!’ I watched it with a mixture of astonishment, admiration and embarrassment: in the end I wasn’t quite sure what I was supposed to feel. I’m not knocking Matt’s Austin Powers impression, which was rather good, or the fact that he threw himself into it with aplomb, in a way that I don’t think he has previously. I reckon that the character was so extreme that he excelled purely because it wasn’t Matt Baker on display, but a well known film character! But the dance itself left me feeling distinctly unmoved, and actually rather bored. Too slow for a jive, and just...too un-jivey!

The least said about the vote-snaring gymnastics the better. I don’t really agree with the maxim that “if you can do something well, do it.” I could tear off all my clothes and streak round the Oval, but I don’t. I wouldn’t inflict that horror on anyone...

Now, hands up who thought Pammy was going to get a nice big 40-shaped birthday surprise? You could see it waiting to happen. Claudia appeared to be priming Craig with the notion, and when the theme from ‘Ghost’ was revealed on ITT I thought Craig was going to burst into tears. And Len, he likes a good-old fashioned ballroom dance. And Bruno; he’s partial to a bit of romance. You could just tell that the configuration of the stars had aligned themselves into a favourable pattern on Pam’s big day to result in the first maximum score of the series. Even hubby Billy C was there to witness it.

I’m going to be controversial. I actually enjoyed this dance more than Kara’s tango. There: I’ve said it. The chuntering on the forums seem to suggest that Pamela is the anti-Christ because she got there before Kara in the big four zero stakes, and that Kara was dreadfully under-marked. Now, I’ve already said that I reckon that Kara should win the whole shebang but that’s not going to stop me from saying that, whilst I thought Pamela’s dance was worth four 9s, I thought the same of Kara’s as well. And what puts Pamela’s above Kara’s? Because it managed to touch the fluffy side of my nature that, frankly, I thought had long shrivelled up like a mouldy cucumber, forgotten in the vegetable compartment of a fridge-freezer. My inner vixen still functions perfectly normally so perhaps I found Kara’s tango less captivating, but when something beautiful comes along and makes me want to snuggle into a slanket, I have to whip out my metaphorical 10. Even if it was really a 9.

Hell’s teeth: did I say that? I’m behaving like Bruno now!

It shouldn’t be about age, and it isn’t really, but I would like to make one point. Pamela’s pretty much a marmite person and that is why I don’t think she is going to win the show, but credit where it’s due: having got into the semi finals at the age of 61 (and done it on merit) she will be the oldest person in 8 series to have made it that far, and that is something worthy of acknowledgement.

Gavin was back in hold this evening. Hurrah! Unfortunately he was doing a Foxtrot, and I cannot abide the wretched dance, so for me he’s lost points just by turning up. He was, however, so much better than he’s been previously, which was heartening if you are a Henson supporter. I still find him a little unnatural and forced at times: I think Katya herself said that it doesn’t come naturally to Gavin, which is possibly why his eyes sometimes seem to glaze over in concentration. As someone who has never been especially kind to Gavin’s many imperfections it is to his great credit that he has got this far, although that may be down mostly to the pulling power of his pectorals! He has got better, it doesn’t look quite as pained as once it did, and his Foxtrot travelled nicely around the floor. But I find something incredibly listless and insipid about Gavin’s dancing. The only dance he’s done that I saw a performance of note was his Paso. Last week’s jive had me hiding my eyes behind my fingers. I didn’t do that tonight, but that was because I was too busy yawning.

Sorry Gav. In Andy Pandy style, it’s “time to go home...”

I don’t need to know if Kara and Artem are up to anything off the dance floor. That is their business. If they do get it together after the show finishes its run then good on them, and I wish them well. Quite why Artem felt the need to announce to the British public that he was going to be asking Kara out I really couldn’t say, but I imagine it was a ploy to grab the ‘showmance’ vote. Well, all I can say to that is this:

Yuck.

Moving on to the dance itself, I loved the idea of using Moulin Rouge’s ‘El Tango de Roxanne’. I’ve been waiting for someone to use that! It’s so dramatic, passionate and violent – perfect for a tango. Anyone who has not seen this section of Moulin Rouge, I have to point you in this direction. If only because Ewan McGregor is so darned cute.


El Tango de Roxanne


I loved what Kara and Artem did with this routine. I think there was a little too much chair-action to be honest, but I can forgive that when they have delivered one of the best tangos in SCD history. Not the best, in my opinion. When Alesha said it was the best, she seemed to have airbrushed Zoe Ball out of history! Still, a high-ranking and worthy dance, and one in which Kara looked stunning. I’d be jealous if I didn’t think she was the bees’ knees!

And that as they say, is that. The couples are getting less and less each week, and next week there will be a double eviction after three nights of Strictly joyousness on the bounce. My dad will go absolutely mental: he can’t stand the show. I will also probably be annoyed come the results show next weekend. There was a double eviction on ‘I’m A Celebrity’ which saw Kayla (not one of my favourites) chucked out followed by Dom (who I wanted to win, even if he didn’t stand a snowflake’s chance). Going by this, we’re going to lose Gavin and Pamela before the final.

What the lord giveth, the lord taketh away...