Perhaps Chelsea Traille was dealt a bad hand this season on So You Think You Can Dance. In the early audition rounds, the beautiful contemporary dancer stood out. When she made the Top 20, she was paired with Thayne Jasperson. The two got along well but couldn’t seem to pull off a dance that impressed the judges outside of week 1’s cha cha. They landed in the bottom three for the second week in a row and it proved to be the last time she would ever dance on that stage. While Thayne was spared, the judges decided that it was ultimately the end of the road for Chelsea. Today, she spoke exclusively to BuddyTV in an interview, talking about making peace with being sent home and what made her partner so great to work with.
Hey everybody this is Gina from BuddyTV and today I’m talking to Chelsea from So You Think You Can Dance. Well, what’s today been like for you because I imagine it must have been hard for you to be eliminated last night and then get up today and talk about it all day with everybody.
Well, I’ve come to peace with it. All the people that are left on the show are amazing and talented and great personalities, so it’s bittersweet but two people have to leave every week. Everybody knows that what you pick does — in essence there are favorites and some have their popularity — some of it is about what America is going to enjoy watching. We had a tough week with the jazz, it was very different I don’t think a lot of people got the concept. And then quickstep is like normally the kiss of death on that show. So you just prepare yourself for it, so you’re not just completely obliterated and shocked when it happens.
Of all the styles of dance that you got to perform, was the quickstep the one that you struggled with the most?
Yeah, definitely hard, definitely hard.
What is it about the quickstep that becomes the kiss of death or the style that dancers seem to struggle with the most?
Essentially, with every dancer there’s a lot of freedom in movement. It’s tough because there’s such strict framework that’s needed to perform the quickstep. It’s just one of those ballroom dances where there’s not a lot of arms moving, there’s basically no arm movement, the feet aren’t rigid but it’s just not like, unless you really know about the quickstep, you’re not really going to go, “Oh wow, that moved me.” It’s hard to get emotionally involved with it, it’s pretty upbeat but it’s not like hip-hop, which is just fun to watch in my opinion.
Do you think that the judges have been particularly tough this season? They seem more critical than ever and more blunt than ever, too.
I think so, I think it wouldn’t be a good competition to have it and to not be as tough. Especially being the fourth season, I would expect them to be because now the bar’s been raised and the bar’s been set and we’ve been able to see many other successful dancers ahead of us. It’s not like first season, where we don’t know.
Well is there anything in particular that the judges said to you in particular that you took offense to, or did you take everything and just try to become a better dancer because of it?
Exactly, you don’t take offense to anything because it’s not personal. No dancer is perfect, any dancer that starts to think they’re above any correction is not going to continue to grow. The main reason I even wanted to get involved with this program was to grow as a dancer, so how can I want to grow and then be opposed to correction, you know?
Well you and Thayne seemed to get along so well, what do you think you’re going to miss most about having him as your partner and working with him on the show?
He has such an amazing work ethic, just the minute we would step out of rehearsal – because we would record what we learned in the rehearsal and practice on our own time in our apartments and we would go over the choreography – and he would be on it literally in the car ride going home from the studio. Some would say that you got to take a break, but he was just so diligent and so focused, and so it took a hold for me too.
Well I know last night you said when you were leaving that this was just the beginning of the future for you. What do you hope to do in the future with dance?
Well, I think that I have a marketable look, and I feel and I know that I’m very talented. I may not be amazing at the quickstep, but there’s a lot of things that I can bring to the dance world. So I think it would be very cool to maybe someday come dance for an artist, that would be pretty awesome. I’m not sure about all the companies out there. I would like to maybe get into some commercials, I think that that would be really fun. These days there are a lot of dancers getting into the commercial industry. I think I could go into any one of those avenues. I had auditioned for an agency a couple years ago and I had gotten it, but I was not wanting to just quit school. I wanted to finish college, and then when I finished college in December I started the So You Think You Can Dance process in January. I had to delay going down that route because of the show, but now that that’s not going to be an issue any more I think I’m going to look into agencies and see what’s available, stick around in L.A. for awhile.
Well I hope things work out for you, you’re a beautiful dancer and I wish you got to stay longer, I was definitely a big fan of yours from the beginning.
Thank you so much, that means the world to me.
– Gina Scarpa, BuddyTV Staff Writer
(Image courtesy of FOX)
Staff Writer, BuddyTV
