The Flu Season: Two weeks after the flu bug first hit the ballroom, Lacey Schwimmer and Donny Osmond fell ill. Anna Trebunskaya filled in for Schwimmer, dancing the fox trot with Mark Dacascos on Monday night. But Osmond tells PEOPLE that for him, the show had to go on. “I just can’t let Kym [Johnson] down,” he said. Clutching a wad of tissue, Osmond stayed an arm’s length away during his post-show interviews. Given the long hours, the strenuous routines and the close proximity in which the stars and pros work, staying healthy is a challenge for everyone. Vitamin C, Emergen-C, and every kind of cold remedy out there is stocked at the craft services table. “If it’s legal, I’m taking it,” Osmond says. “The room was literally spinning tonight when we did the quickstep. I thought I was dancing on the ceiling for a bit.”
Who Wears the Pants: For Monday night’s show the celebrities — instead of the pros — took their ideas to the DWTS wardrobe department. Mya chose a long gown for herself and an ivory suit with a magenta shirt and tie for her partner, Dmitri Chaplin. “Dmitri was very insecure about the idea of me designing the costumes this week,” Mya says. “I’ve been wearing a lot of short stuff, so tonight I wore a gown and I picked out a magenta shirt for him and I was tired of the black and white suits so I put him in a cream suit tonight.” What did Chaplin think? “It was incredible. I thought it looked amazing,” he said. Kelly Osbourne revealed why she cooked up a pair of turquoise fringe pants for her partner, Louis Van Amstel: “Every week I’ll say, ‘I want a black dress,’ and then I’ll come in and it will be gray,’” Osbourne says. “I have ended up loving all of my dresses, really, but this week he called them up and said to add tassels to my dress … So I called them up and I said, ‘Add tassel pants for Louis.’”
Pressure Cooker: Feeling the pressure as the season hits its home stretch, Osbourne says she’s been having a hard time keeping her cool. “It’s unbelievable now and it’s more intense than you will ever imagine,” she says. “I care so much about this that I’m at home crying or I’m practicing my arm moves while I’m doing dishes or brushing my teeth.” Van Amstel says he can tell that Osbourne’s commitment level has risen week by week. “I feel the pressure is actually off because we’ve been fighting since week three to get her to burst that bubble and find her mojo,” he says. “So now I feel if we stay [in the competition] from now on, it will be fun because we’re pushing together. We have nothing to lose. If we go home tomorrow, we’ve already won.”
Facing Tough Critics: She’s one of the season’s most consistent and best performers. So why is it every week judge Len Goodman gives Mya and Chaplin their lowest score? “I don’t think he has anything against us,” Mya says. “He wants us to keep pushing to the next level so that we can reach three tens. We’re not achieving some factor in our dance. Either it’s too technical and Bruno [Tonioli] and Carrie Ann [Inaba] won’t like it, or it’s too performance-based or gimmicky. So we have to find a happy medium to please the audience, the three judges and ourselves and be true to the dance.”
Hough Love: Derek Hough and Joanna Krupa had some fun with their video package on Monday night, concocting an over-the-top fantasy sequence complete with slow-motion beach running and a kiss. After their rumba Monday night, which also had equal parts drama and passion, Hough ran over to give an “all in good fun” handshake to Krupa’s fiancé, Miami nightclub owner Romain Zago. “We were laughing at ourselves all week and having a good time, having fun with it,” says Hough, who will perform on Tuesday night’s results show with Mark Ballas and the Ballas Hough Band. “It’s exciting for me to hear him perform,” Krupa says. –Monica Rizzo
Permalink | Comments (162)
