Swannsong

Week 10: Top 7 Results - 25 November 2018

Last night! The perils of live TV meant the judging of the lindyhopathon was the biggest clusterfuck on this show since, well, since what happened to Danny, probably, what a series it’s been. Also some dancing, much of which was not particularly good, leaving Faye at the top and Lauren at the bottom. Tonight! Someone's going home.  

But first... the much hyped return of Arlene - not that she's in any way visible (and can't say I really blame her, although I find it interesting that this series, full of drama as it is, is the one with a lot of olive branch action - Trent, Jill, Arlene... who next, James Jordan?).

The collaboration she has choreographed with Candoco dance company, the pros (plus Trent, Gordana and various hangers-on) features Anton as the ringleader of a pansexual, polyamorous group of dancers, and it's mean'n'moody contempowaft with bits of ballroom and Latin technique, lots of dry ice and chandeliers, all to 'Life on Mars'. It's exciting, dramatic and there are probably way too many people on stage to really grasp what's going on, but it's a great example of disabled and able-bodied performers working together seamlessly, and somehow Arlene's managed to get Anton to cartwheel backwards off a table, so hats off!

Tess  and Claudia enter, Claudia wearing, well, the fur from a yeti that's been dipped in tinsel. Tess is wearing red, with missing patches on the shoulders. Perhaps the yeti ate them before Claudia skinned it.

They remind us of the Lindy Hop-athon results again. A bit more. Just in case. And then revisit the leaderboard. I feel a lot of that was more for the benefit of the people in the studio who are still reeling from what happened an hour or so ago in their time than those of us who've had a day to recover.

The judges enter: Shirley and Bruno; Craig and Darcey – all in black now. Darcey in a dress that appears to be half black lace, half black bin bag, and Craig in some bondage necklacey things that look like he nicked them from Bruno's wardrobe as a dare.  

Interminable recap of last night in which the following happens: Hot Greg pretends to have lost control of the time and needs some more acting training if he wants to seem convincing; Oti rehearses in an ugly peach hoodie; Stacey and Kevin aren't entirely taking the lindy choreo very seriously in rehearsals; Faye’s dress looks even more saggy up close; Dianne calls street commercial 'street com'; Stacey bangs the set after her 10s - not sure she should do that too hard, it’ll fall down. The best moment of the night (i.e. the Lindy hop fuckup) isn't covered.

Will we have a battle of the bottom two goddesses in a Graeme vs Charles dance-off? Well, before we find out, here's another look at the leaderboard because we have no attention span.

Safe are: Joe and Dianne; Faye and Giovanni. In the dance-off? Graeme and Oti.

Tess says Graeme wants to be here next week to do musicals week. Oh fuck, this means I DO have two-dance week fucketty fucking fuck. Anyway, Graeme, you already did movies week, it's the exact same thing, you won't be missing much. [Also he literally just did musical theatre for his couple's choice routine last week! - Steve]

In the Clauditorium, Joe says he's never got to a quarter final of anything and he’s prepared to keep pushing himself in genres. Dianne says he was like Bambi on ice with his skinny long limbs at the start, but he worked really hard. Joe worries if he really does have skinny long limbs. Also, for the ship watchers  - lots of hugs between them. Faye's crying again, so it's surely only a matter of time before she goes full Gumede. Also she and Giovanni have 'The Lonely Goatherd' next week, which is the most hilarious thing I can imagine. What's harder to imagine is exactly what genre they'll be dancing. Wacky songs lend themselves to Charleston but the speed and rhythm of that song don't seem right. If anything, its beats might be closer to a samba (and Lord know she's overdue party Latin) but even Anton at his fever dream best wouldn't choreograph a goatherd samba, so I can't see Giovanni doing it. Either way, colour me intrigued.

Time now for special guest performer, the ghost of Rod Stewart’s voice. He's croaking out some drivel about how it was all better in the old days before political correctness, all whilst Johannes, Luba, Graziano and Katya as the forces of modern multicultural millenialism prance about at a bar in Soho in front, with the women in trousers and the men in tight satiny pants all genderfucking the place up to Rod’s old wittering about men being men, our generation doesn't give a flying fuck about your cultural appropriation white guys can totally sing the blues and play basketball and do urbanstreet contemporary, also, while you're at it, get off my lawn.  Then there's even some homerotic same sex dancing before the men are denied their true love and forced to go off with the women, but they come back and miss each other in a sad metaphor for the olden days when heteronormativity was king and people were repressing their true selves. I mean, I suppose you could see it all as a literal interpretation of Rod’s sad story about his old drinking chum dying and a loving tribute to the 60s/70s but I choose to believe it's all some sort of metaphor about Brexiteers vs Snowflakes or something. Either way, one of the more interesting pros dancing about in front of guest performer dances this series.  As long as you didn't pay any attention to the bevy of blondes in red swaying and clicking behind Rod like Robert Palmer's cast-offs circa 1985.

Dance debrief time: Stacey's determination paid off; Faye’s perfection is being illustrated by her footwork flailing a bit, then the endless pivot. Craig explains Joe’s 7 by showing the timing and moaning about props again and not calling it 'street' enough, because Craig is absolutely the arbiter of street-ness - he knows what it is, he's just street tuff. Bruno is also asked to justify his 10 for Ashley. [Baffled that Craig has to explain his 7 for Joe and Bruno has to explain his 10 for Ashley but Shirley and Bruno get away scot-free with giving Joe 10s for that MESS. - Steve] Basically it was 'because sex'. Even in those beige outfits? Good to see that even after his momentary lapse into being the anchor on the sinking ship, he’s back to his usual self.

Weekly plug for the various paratexts: ITT, the podcast, Facebook, Instagram, Danny John Jules' mildly aggressive conspiracy theory tweets, iPlayer, ViewMaster reel, readalong storybook and cassette, brain implant etc.

And now for Results 2: Electric Boogaloo.  Lauren and AJ are safe, meaning they must be in the top 3 of the audience vote, which I'm... kind of surprised by? Maybe? Stacey and Kevin are also safe, putting Ashley and Charles into the before bottom 2 - and.... it's Ashley and Pasha, leading Charles and Karen pulling shocked face for the ages. Wow, our first proper LEADERBOARD PLUNGE.  I voted for her for the first time this week because I thought this could be the outcome, but still, from second with the judges to either last or second last with the public. Oof. More importantly – we've all been robbed of Charles vs Graeme, the dance-off to end all dance-offs.  

Darcey tells her to soften it down (like it matters what she does when she’s against Graeme) and Darcey doesn’t understand why she’s here, even though it happens to every ringer round about the time the pack thins out and they don’t top the leaderboard. [Yeah, I mean I'm not saying it's predictable, but this is the exact week it happened to Alexandra for the first time, albeit from slightly lower on the leaderboard. - Steve]

In the Clauditorium, we're with Lauren and AJ. Lauren loves musicals - she used to go with her grandparents (because Joe isn't the only one who's had them), but, tellingly, doesn't know what they're doing next week - is that because there was a plan for them not to be here? Charles can barely breathe and says 'without you guys there is no us' which is all a bit existentialist. Also, they’re bringing the rumba back next week for our first official bloke rumba! Karen cackles like a fool at this. Bodes well. Stacey is very excited and doesn’t know anything about musicals but K does – they're dancing to a song from Les Mis but no announcement of song/genre. A Charleston to 'Master of the House?'  A rumba to 'I Dreamed a Dream'? An Argentine Tango to, I dunno, 'Castle on a Cloud' or something weird enough to compete with 'The Lonely Goatherd'?

Musicals trailer, unfortunately featuring Graeme sating this is the one he's been looking forward to from the word go. Hang on, wasn’t that Blackpool? It's all done in hazy yellow light that looks kind of sinister – musicals week is meant to be happy week people.

Graeme and Oti dance first and the dance is, if anything, even worse second time round although I suppose it doesn’t matter. He just doesn’t appear very committed to the footwork and his grin has become a grimace. Also, the instrumentation and Hayley's vocal are conspiring to make it all sound a bit sinister, like the song's about to kill you. Still his salute at the end feels like a good sign-off move.

Ashley and Pasha's dance is pretty much the same as before: still not much bounce, but plenty of wiggle and facial gymnastics.

Craig saves A&P as it’s 'a no-brainer' with a slight Pah-sha creeping in because Ashley's infecting everyone. Darcey saved them for being more technically efficient (not like my bloody technical equipment yesterday); Bruno for 'no disrespect' but it being evident they were much much stronger on every level. Shirley would also have saved them.

Graeme says he’d have voted for Ashley and Pasha as well. He thanks everyone. Faye is weeping buckets up on the staircase. Who'd have thought she was a secret Graeme friend, would have been fun to learn more about that friendship. Graeme jokes that he had a secret 25 years of ballroom training that he kept quiet. He thanks everyone, especially Oti, and says he'll never open his fingers in ballroom, but it will be nice to spend more time with wife and kids though, and that he thought he was on borrowed time, and unless he learned to fly he wouldn’t make it past next week (I bet they would have flown him in next week if he was here). Oti says she's never laughed so much or been so angry so much, will miss their carpool karaoke with him on journeys, and she's made a friend for life.

They dance out to 'I Try' and have clearly not rehearsed as they are trying to do entirely different things. Credits post-mortem? Ashley says Graeme and Oti were her best friends (?!) and Joe will miss him laughing. 

Next week - will the bus finally hit Lauren? Will Charles dodge another dance-off via the power of Blokerumba sympathy votes? Will they take the war with Danny one step further by using Starlight Express? And what the hell will 'The Lonely Goatherd' dance be all about?  Join Steve then for curtain up!