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A Cure For The 'Dancing' Blues
If you just can't wait until "Dancing With The Stars" returns in March then ohhh, do I have got something for you?! The "Dancing With The Stars" tour kicks off Wednesday, December 17 in San Diego. The two-month tour will cover 37 cities and feature Lance Bass, Maurice Green and Toni Braxton from season seven and Marlee Matlin from season six. They'll be joined on the tour by professional dancers Karina Smirnoff, Cheryl Burke, Lacey Schwimmer, Derek Hough, Mark Ballas, Kym Johnson, Edyta Sliwinska, Alec Mazo, Fabian Sanchez and Maksim Chmerkovskiy (who will be choreographing this year's tour).
I had a chance to check out tour rehearsals this week to see how the other dancers are handling Maksim as "the boss." I jokingly asked Cheryl Burke if he was being a Russian tyrant - because on "Dancing" it looks like he can be pretty tough on his celebrity partners.
According to Cheryl, "Maks is truly laid back but good laid back. We all truly respect him and you know he does great choreography and at the same time he lets us do what we want to do. If we have our own flavor, if we want to add something different he lets us do that too."
Kym Johnson agrees that Maks can be pretty mellow but jokes, "Maks is kind of like my boss which is kind of weird. I'm getting a taste of what Mel B went through. Oh gosh! I feel sorry for you Mel!"
The whole crew will be traveling together on buses with the celebrities getting a private bus and the dancers having to share. Is this fair? Some of these dancers are now as famous as the celebrities on the show. I'm just saying!
Lance Bass told me having toured with *NSync for so many years, he's actually looking forward to two months on the road.
"I have such insomnia and I can only fall asleep on airplanes and buses. But that's what happens when you like grow up on a bus... it just rocks you to sleep. It's good."
For information on tour dates and how to get tickets visit www.dancingwiththestarsontour.com
Also note that season six champ Kristi Yamaguchi will join the tour for three dates including her hometown performance on December 19th at HP Pavilion in San Jose, CA; December 27th at STAPLES Center in Los Angeles, CA and December 28th at Jobing.com Arena in Glendale, AZ. Cody Linley will join the tour for seven consecutive dates beginning Jan 22nd at St. Pete Times Forum in Tampa, FL; January 23rd at BankAtlantic Center in Ft. Lauderdale, FL; January 24th at Amway Arena in Orlando, FL; January 25th at The Arena at Gwinnett Center in Duluth, GA; January 27th at Greensboro Coliseum in Greensboro, NC; January 28th at RBC Center in Raleigh, NC and January 29th at Verizon Center in Washington, DC.
The dancers are indeed as popular as some of the "celebs" on the show. It's not really fair that they don't get the same treatment.
Please do not spread false information about any body having bag blood on the tour.
Alec is choosing to dance with his wife in the group numbers.
If the DWTS couple, like Alec and Toni, are not crowd favorites, then who cares if they dance together on the tour? Toni and Alec were great out the gate, but never got any better, which doesn't say a lot for Alec's ability to teach. Edyta has this same problem with her celeb partners. Jason T. had awkward arms in week 1 and still had them in week 10.