Two dancers break down a samba to a Tarzan song from Dancing with the Stars' Disney week. They talk about the fear of improvising on live TV and how the audience reacted to the risky, emotional performance.
Can you think of a moment that you were scared where there was magic on the other side?
Every time I'm creating, honestly, it's coming out of my brain and who knows? Like, taking risk. Actually, there was this past season. I don't know if you've ever seen Dancing with the Stars.
I've seen it, but I'm not.
Okay.
Not super familiar.
It's a silly, silly, fun dance show. But there was this week, and it was. It was a Disney themed week, which basically each couple gets a Disney themed movie, and you have to create a dance off of it in a certain style. This week was terrifying me because we were doing a certain style that no one wants to do on the show, and I chose to do it. So I was already miserable with myself.
But do they coerce you to do it or you decided we're going to do it?
Certain music dictates the style. So, like, for example, we were doing this Tarzan song, and it could only be one of two styles. It was either a samba or a quick step. I didn't want to do a quick step because I felt like it was the easy way out. So I did a samba. Punched me in the face. It was such a hard week. My partner was frustrated. I was frustrated. It was the only time we had really gotten into, like, an argument during our season. And we were one day in rehearsal, we're sitting there, and there was a section of music, and it was about four bars long. And I just had no idea what to do. I had no inspiration left. I was over it. I was like, I can't. And so my partner was like, you've got it. Like, we're gonna do this. And so I was like, you know what? I'm gonna do something that I never do, and I'm gonna be spontaneous, and I'm going to, like, improvise. Improvise this on the spot. We made up these two eights of choreography together on the spot. I'd never done that in my whole career. I always come prepared with movement. So I did it. I. I was. And also, it was, like, moves I would never do. I was, like, rolling on the ground, like, doing this worm on the ground. And I was like, you know what? Screw it. I'm freaking dressed up as Jane. He's Tarzan. He has a crazy wig on. Like, what is life? Let's not take this so seriously. We did this. We competed. Went viral. Abs. That specific section went viral for, like, weeks on social media. Now, not that that means anything, but I was, like, so terrified of the reaction. People were going to give this section because it was not genicoded at all. And the response was insane. Millions of people were doing it. We're redoing it. It was just everywhere. And, like, that was everybody's favorite part of our season. And I was just like, duh. Have more fun. Take risks. There is magic to that. Maybe it doesn't work out all the time, but, like, it might. And you'll be so sh. Shocked by the response.
I love that.
I'll show you my tarzan dance later.
