American Idol ends, So You Think You Can Dance begins, Simon Fuller and Nigel Lythgoe get paid, and the world keeps on spinnin’. As I did throughout the American Idol season, I’ll be giving my live thoughts for each episode of the So You Think You Can Dance season. I am not a professional dancer and, thus, any analysis/criticism of the dancing should be taken with a grain of salt. It’s the season premiere tonight, which means a lot of footage of bad dancing.
What follows are my live thoughts while watching the episode.
Hey, it’s Cat Deeley. Are you attractive or aren’t you? You never cease to baffle me.
Freakin’ Mary Murphy. Get out of my head. She is a permanent host and I couldn’t be less happy about it. If you’re new to the show, Mary is like a louder, more obnoxious Paula Abdul.
The audition cities this year are Chicago, Los Angeles, Atlanta and New York.
Tonight, we do New York.
Dan Karaty joins Nigel and Mary on the judges panel tonight.
Dancing Derrick kicks off the NYC auditions.
Dancing Derrick: Has danced 22 straight hours. Wears a t-shirt with his own name on it. Calls himself a “historic landmark.”
He’s a crazy, jiggly-legged rave dancer. Give him a glow stick. Enthusiastic, yet terrible. He collapses on the floor after the routine. Derrick is a crazy person. He actually needs and receives medical attention after he leaves the stage.
I don’t mean to be crass, but they shouldn’t let really fat people try out. Especially if they’re dancing to an Evanescence song.
Crazy, high socks wearing girl wearing a tutu and a crown. She explains that it was an interpretive dance in which she played Jesus.
Anya Garris, ballroom dancer. She is pretty darn sexy and does a ballroom routine with a dude I could care less about. The judges send both straight to Vegas.
We get a montage of really good dancers heading to Vegas.
Next, it’s kind of a crazy lady (named Heather) who had bone spurs in her hip, had surgery, was told to stop dancing, but has now returned to the dance floor. She has a ton of tattoos. She was alright. Nothing special, I didn’t think. But, the judges like her and her story, so she’s heading to Vegas.
On Day 1 in NYC, 32 dancers make it to Vegas.
More Crazy Derrick. He’s really crazy.
Day 2 begins.
Jenna DeGozzio (spelled wrong, probably). She loves dance. I doubt that she’s going any good. Kind of a mental midgets.
And Jenna is a terrible dancer. For Jenna, delusion set in a long time ago. Unless she’s joking, faking the whole thing. Then, it’s pretty funny.
She claims that she teaches break dancing to little kids. Nigel, who has vowed not to be mean this year, bites his tongue.
Chasmar Wells, 18 year old visual arts student. He’s somewhat flamboyant, but a really bad dancer. He was trying to be abstract.
Melissa Browne, a squat girl, is terrible. Nigel calls her “the dancing version of Ugly Betty.”
Nigel breaks his vow and starts verbally abusing people.
Hannah Lee, a 22 year old born and raised in Israel. In Israel, she worked at wedding events and dance halls. One night….
HOLY CRAP!! THIS IS ONE OF THE CRAZIEST THINGS I’VE EVER SEEN!!
They have footage from a party Hannah was dancing at from back in Israel in 2001. Everyone is dancing on the dance floor when, suddenly, the whole dance floor collapses, taking down like a hundred people with it. The whole floor just collapses at once.
Hannah went with it, fell three and a half stories like everyone else. 24 people died, a bunch more injured. Hannah broke her jaw, and now has metal plates in her face. Crazy stuff.
Well, I’m rooting for Hannah. Please be good.
She’s not that good. Shoot. She’s trying to be a hip-hop dancer. Nigel and Mary agree that they want to see how she does with choreography.
E-Knock Phillips from Boston is a crazy break dancing hip-hop dancer. Incredibly good. He’s heading to the choreography round.
He’s in the same crew as the next dancer, Jamaal. Jamaal is a big dude and he’s pretty good, but wild. They’re going to let him learn some choreography.
Joel and Carmen are swing dancing together. This is notable because they used to date. Not anymore. They both seem a little nuts. Joel wears yellow tinted spectacles. They dance swing like I danced swing at my middle school dances while hopped up on coke and pretzels. That is, to say, enthusiastically but horribly.
Carmen is a lunatic that thinks she’s a legitimately good dancer.
Katharine Watts is the instructor at a dance studio.
Ashley Keegan is her student and he is also auditioning.
She is VERY scantily clad. They both are. Ashley is good, and only 18. She’s going to Vegas.
Katharine is up next. She admits that Ashley is better than her. We see that Ashley is, in fact, better. But Katharine is pretty darn good herself and she’s going to Vegas.
Last Season’s Top 20 finalist Stanislav has brought is hot sister Faina to try out. They dance together, which must be a little weird.
Faina is going through to Vegas. She was really an incredible dancer.
Jamaal is back on stage, now performing some swing.
WOW. That was one of the cooler things I’ve ever seen. He absolutely rips it up when the swing starts up. A whole lot of fun. He’s going to the choreography round.
“Sex” is back. If you know what that means, you watched the auditions last year. If you don’t what it means, I’m not going to waste your time with it.
He’s a legitimately insane human being.
Sex’s mom is back. Sex and his mom must have a pretty freaking bizarre relationship.
All right, the NYC auditions are done. The choreography round happens. E-Knock gets booted. Jamaal is going to Vegas. So is Hannah Lee.
We’ll be back tomorrow with a full recap of tonight’s show.
-Oscar Dahl, BuddyTV Senior Writer
(Image Courtesy of FOX)
Senior Writer, BuddyTV
