Strictly - Musical Quarter-Finals

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It’s not only Musicals week, but also Quarter-Finals. We kick off with a pro dance around the Mamma Mia musical, including Anton and Bruno dancing together, and Craig joins in as well, which is all good fun. Either Tess’s dress has half fallen down, or somebody designed it like that, but she looks like a glamorous milkmaid.

Lauren & AJ (American Smooth). Lauren wheels out her great-nan in a bid for viewer support. Routine is to a South Pacific tune and the backing dancers are back in force. Lauren has a long dress and is actually acting her part pretty well here. She looks happy and confident and this is very nice and neat. Very enjoyable. Shirley tells her she was outstanding and centred while Craig calls it “gorgeous”. Lauren looks much more at ease when she’s not put in short skirts. 8,9,9,9, for 35 points which I think is her best score by some way.

Faye & Giovanni (Charleston). Dancing to “Lonely goatherd” from Sound of Music, so they are sent off into the Elstree countryside to find mountains and goats, but only manage to find sheep. They do find a champion yodeller though, and Giovanni yodels for us, though with far more enthusiasm than skill. They are dressed as puppets and Giovanni may have the worst costume of the series, with yellow lederhosen, a leprechaun’s cap, and freckles. For the routine they start off hanging from wires in a puppet frame with a couple of dancing goats for company, do some puppet motions, then unhook themselves without a break in the dancing and are perfectly in sync and in puppety character with a scary lift or two where Faye's head is almost brushing the floor. Spectacular stuff and a strong contender for the dance of the series. Darcey tells them they’re extraordinary, Shirley says “not a flaw” (giving a possible clue as to her score) while Craig says he liked the goats and Faye wasn’t bad either. Craig gives a 10 so that’s 40 points and Giovanni thanks the choreographer for putting together their routine.

Charles & Karen (Rumba). Dancing to “Maria” from West Side Story. This is a fairly subtle and understated routine. Charles is pretty impressive with his fluidity here, even though everyone knows the rumba is hard for a male celeb. Good to watch. Darcey says “oh my goodness” twice and praises how he led the dance, also informing us that male celebs have trouble with rumbas. Craig criticises his free arm, before saying it was probably the best ever rumba from a male celeb. 8,9,9,9 for 35 points.

Ashley & Pasha (Quickstep). Dancing to a number from “Funny Girl”. Another spectacular dance with a few props, lots of energetic content and a few changes of pace. This is pretty brilliant and Ashley really had to be fit to keep up with all that. Even Pasha looks a bit out of breath. Shirley says there was too much difficult content and there should have been more slow and easy bits to make a contrast. It clearly takes an awful lot to get Pasha angry – he’s endured face-painting, 8 months pregnant outfits, silly hats and other horrors – but Shirley has actually managed to annoy him here, though it’s hard to spot an angry Pasha, he just goes a bit thin-lipped. Ashley is also surprised at being told it’s a fault to have lots of difficult content. The other judges also have a bit of a dig at the routine being too demanding, and come up with miniscule criticisms like her third toe-nail not being straight, though Craig does at least grudgingly mention that Ashley's dancing was fantastic. All a bit odd. Ironic they were dancing to “Don’t Rain on my Parade” because the judges just did exactly that. I think Pasha and Ashley put everything they could into this and thought they'd got a real showstopper. 9,10,9,10 for 38 points.

Stacey & Kevin (American Smooth). They’re dancing to “I dreamed a dream” from Les Miserables. Stacey gets pulled about by the backing dancers, then does a bit of waltzing with a mutton-chopped Kevin, then she's spun about a lot with her feet off the floor, then carried about some more. She looks good in a blue dress, and performs it well, but there wasn’t really that much dance content there. However, as we saw with Ashley, the judges have temporarily gone off the idea of dance content being any kind of a good thing. Bruno is emotional at the sheer beauty of it all, Shirley says how magical it was while Craig says it wasn’t technically perfect but was real, honest and truthful which makes him sound like the Advertising Standards Authority. 9,9,10,10 for 38 points to tie Stacey with Ashley. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if Pasha is now developing a slight frown at the injustice of it all.

Joe & Dianne (Salsa). They’re doing something from “Joseph and Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat” so Jason Donovan is drafted in to advise Joe. As the judges have told us many times, lifts are illegal in the Salsa, so it’s a bit of a surprise to see the routine start with Joe held aloft by the backing dancers. When they put him down on the floor, well, as Uncle Len would say, he comes out and he gives it a go, but he’s pretty stiff and this just isn’t very good. He sits on various backing dancers’ knees, and then they pick him up, walk around a bit with him and then very slowly lift him high up by his feet for the finish. Pretty poor stuff for the quarter-finals, but he’ll probably get 110 points from the judges, as long as they didn’t spot the 30 seconds of illegal lifts. The coat was very colourful – liked that. Bruno praises his sparkling energy and magical charm, Craig says he lacked fluidity but presented it brilliantly, Darcey loved the bits where other people lifted him, and Shirley swoons over how well he stood up straight when being lifted up. Joe makes the interesting point to Claudia that it’s quite scary being lifted up so high – it’s unusual for a male celeb to get hoisted up in the air. 8,9,9,10 for 36 points.

After all that, Faye is top, Ashley/Stacey tied for second, then Joe (!) with Charles & Lauren equal last on 35 points. It’s time for voting to open, and Janette is dressed as a Diddyman. The best show for ages as far as dance quality and entertainment goes, with Joe’s being the only real dud. Really hard to predict the bottom two, as there are good reasons to think everyone could be safe. Faye is top, Stacey is popular, Ashley should get a rebound from last week’s bottom two, while Charles and Lauren have clearly been picking up votes. I’ll go for Faye and Charles to be in the dance-off.

RESULTS SHOW

Pro dance has them all dressed as hippies. Oh look, Tess is looking to get plum velour back in fashion. Stacey is through first, then Faye, with Charles first in the dance-off. More “advice” from Bruno “I’m sure it’ll be even better next time”.

Adam Lambert sings “We are the Champions” while Neil and Katya do the dancing. There’s a lot of shiny black leather/plastic on display here.
More results and Joe is through so it’s now between Ashley and Lauren. They both expect to be in the dance-off, but it’s Ashley again. Lauren’s reaction is good, as her eyes just widen, then she wonders if it’s ok to celebrate. Clearly Ashley has no support at all from the public.

Bruno tells Ashley the public didn’t vote for her because they wanted to see her great routine again, which is giving the public way too much credit. Both dance-off routines are equally good, and this week the judges are a bit politer about picking Ashley to go through. Karen says how humble Charles is (really?) and Charles doesn’t quite prove her point by talking “what good scores my, er, our dance got”. Charles has had a good run in the series, and been one of the more interesting contestants with an up and down Journey, with his highlight being the Samba at Blackpool.

Their farewell dance is to “And I am telling you I am not going” (although they definitely are going) showing a wicked sense of humour from someone in production. Pity they didn’t start with this theme earlier, there’s plenty of choice “Come Back and Stay”, “Don’t you want me?”, “Don’t you forget about me”, "Should I stay or should I go?", One More Night” etc. etc.

In the brief clips with each pairing at the end, Pasha is giving a Paddington Bear Hard Stare right down the camera to the viewers for their lack of support. He really is pashed off.