dancing with the stars

Usually, the bantering (arguing?) on 'Dancing With the Stars' takes place between pro dancers and their celebrity partners, but on last night's performance show Maksim Chmerkovskiy traded some strong words with judge Carrie Ann Inaba.

Chmerkovskiy took exception to Inaba critcizing his creative choice to wait until four beats passed before starting his "instant dance," a cha cha cha to Kate Perry's 'Teenage Dream,' with partner Brandy Norwood.

The Ukranian-born dancer didn't feel that Brandy should've been penalized with a lower score for his decision.

Host Tom Bergeron deftly tried to squash the tension by proclaiming, "Welcome to 'Ballroom Smackdown.'"

A new week and a new injury led to ... another surprising result on 'Dancing With the Stars' (Mon., 8PM ET on ABC).

[Warning: Spoiler alert.]

Tonight's quarterfinal 'DWTS' episode featured a twist -- the "INSTANT DANCE." This meant the players did a regular routine, plus an "instant" routine. For the instant section, the couples didn't know what song they would be dancing to, until the second they stepped onto the ballroom floor.

The "instant" concept would have been hard enough, but contestant Jennifer Grey also suffered her third injury of the season. Ms. Grey was already coping with an old neck injury, plus a pinched nerve in her foot. Now, she had to deal with tendinitis in her knees. Jeez. Could anything else possibly go wrong for her?

['Dancing With the Stars' - 'Instant Dance Challenge']

This week on 'Dancing With the Stars' the couples had to pretend they were professionals and were given the music to their second dance 20 minutes before their routines. There could have been several techniques used in teaching the stars, but most of the celebrities just taught a routine by counts instead of music. The test worked out well and we'll probably see this theme return next season. The confidence that the celebrities exhibited was the biggest factor of success, but how I wished that there was a crash and burn on live television.

By this round of 'Dancing With the Stars,' the celebrities are basically filling up the empty gaps in their dances. Brandy will be going into Week 9 with the biggest advantage: She only has the Argentine Tango and Paso Doble left, two of the biggest crowd-pleasers and highest score-getters.

Former NBA star Rick Fox is the latest celeb booted from 'Dancing With the Stars.' Fox appeared on 'Good Morning America' (weekdays, 7AM ET on ABC) and talked about how his experience on the show has strengthened ties with both his daughter and girlfriend Eliza Dushku.

ABC announced the cast of its new series, 'Skating With the Stars,' on last night's episode of 'Dancing With the Stars.' The spinoff show will feature six celebrities learning how to figure skate with professionals.

Competing for the title are reality star Bethenny Frankel, actresses Sean Young and Rebecca Budig, musician Vince Neil, Olympic skier Jonny Moseley and actor/rapper Brandon Mychal Smith. Their professional partners will be announced soon, and Entertainment Weekly reports that the pros "won't necessarily be household names so don't hold out for, say, a Brian Boitano or a Kristi Yamaguchi."

Despite having just achieved his best scores yet (including a 10), Rick Fox was the surprise elimination from week 7 of 'Dancing With the Stars.' The former pro basketball player and partner Cheryl Burke talked about the experience on 'Jimmy Kimmel Live' (weeknights, 12:05AM ET on ABC).

After Jimmy Kimmel chided him for crying on national television, the host noted, "You said that this is harder than Game 7 of an NBA final? ... First of all, I don't think you've been in a Game 7, right?"

Right. Technically, Fox has only gotten as far as the Western Conference finals. But "I prepared for that," he explained. Concerning 'Dancing,' "I had no previous dance experience ... You don't know how to dance, and you have to learn it really quickly and perform it in front of America four days later."

Kimmel then chatted with Burke about dancing with the "freakishly tall" (6-foot-7) Fox.

America voted and the results are in: Some of those senate races may take a day or two to settle, but it's all over for one 'Dancing With the Stars' celeb, who was sent home despite earning their best scores yet this week.

To celebrate the show's hitting the 200th episode milestone, several awards were handed out, including Most Dramatic Moment (to fainting Marie Osmond), and Best Worst Dancer (Kenny Mayne, who beat out other "two left feet" nominees Master P, Kate Gosselin Steve Wozniak, and Billy Ray Cyrus).

Which well-liked star is hanging up their dancing shoes? We'll tell you, after the cut.

Audrina Patridge was shocked to have been eliminated last week on 'Dancing With the Stars.' Today on 'The Wendy Williams Show,' (weekdays, syndicated) she recounted the moment the judges announced she and her partner Tony were eliminated. She also cleared up an item of interest, explaining that when Tony mouthed "it's us" to her before the elimination, it was because he could tell from the position of the camera that they were next to be eliminated and wanted to give her some advanced warning.

Not only did Audrina get booted off the show, but she's been left hanging on a marriage proposal too. Her boyfriend had told her he would propose to her at the end of the show's run. That has yet to happen. "I didn't make it to the end, so I guess I'm not getting proposed to," said the former 'Hills' star.

That makes perfect sense. She does have to keep some suspense going for her next reality show, right?

Scores don't always matter on 'Dancing With the Stars.' (Just ask Audrina Patridge and Tony Dovolini, who, despite being ranked second from the top last week, got the boot.)

Still, with only six couples remaining in the competition, low-ranking teen activist Bristol Palin and partner Mark Ballas could exit the show tonight.

Ballas' father, Corky Ballas, who was paired with Florence Henderson this season, isn't surprised that his talented son has lasted this long in the competition. Sure, he's biased, but Corky knows Mark's a great teacher.

"Votes play a huge part on the show," Corky said. "Bristol has amazing flow and technical footwork. The voting's keeping her in there. She doesn't get emotional. She's cool as a cucumber."

['Dancing with the Stars' - 200th Episode Special]

The theme of the 'Dancing With the Stars' 200th episode was really "Reuse Music Night." There was no way the contestants could recreate magic that two past contestants had, so they needed to be as original as possible. The team cha-cha challenge had former winners as coaches this week, but they didn't help much. (Though they did make for an excellent former contestant drinking game, since the cameras kept cutting to Chuck Lidell and Jerry Rice.)

It seems like a given that as long as you have Derek Hough in your group dance, you automatically win. Even with Kurt (or in previous seasons, weaker contestants like Pamela Anderson, Kelly Osbourne, Ty Murray and Warren Sapp) the dance brought the weaker contestants' game up. I'd love to see Derek take a break next season and see how the teams would do without his choreography.

Pro Opening Dance - It looked like they recycled the Team GaGa cha-cha outfits from last season. It was nice seeing Ashly and Damian back, though it would have been interesting to see Edyta and Alec back for a short moment.The group work in the circle at the end was great, and I really wished they would open every season with a full pro group dance.

We had comebacks galore on tonight's 'Dancing With the Stars' (Mon., 8PM ET on ABC). But would a player who was battling injures make it all the way back?

[Warning: Spoiler alert.]

Early this season, Jennifer Grey was the 'DWTS' front runner. Then, the actress was derailed by nagging physical problems. She suffered a pinched nerve in her foot, and reactivated an old neck injury. Jennifer has a metal plate in her neck, dating back to a 1987 car accident involving her then-boyfriend Matthew Broderick. She has been warned that competing on the show could cause further damage.

Last week, Grey found herself in the bottom two, facing elimination along with Audrina Patridge. The actress spent much of this week's rehearsal time weeping in frustration. Though Jennifer looks many years younger, she's actually 50 years old. And she's worried that her body can't handle the stress of dancing anymore.

We're about to boldly go ... where no talk show host and guest have gone before. It's dance ... the final frontier. William Shatner showed up on 'Jimmy Kimmel Live' (weeknights, 12AM ET on ABC). During the interview, Kimmel suggested that Shatner would make a ideal contestant on 'Dancing With the Stars.'

But Shatner poo-pooed the idea. He pointed out that the show lasts forever, and he's not the youngest guy anymore. "They want four months of your time!" he said.

William is no coward -- after all, he's the original James T. Kirk, heroic captain of the USS Enterprise. Shatner just is too busy to take part in 'DWTS.' Still, in order to prove his dancing bravery, the actor decided to teach Jimmy how to do the waltz. But first, there was a tiny matter to clear up. Which of them would "lead' in the dance? That is, who would be "the man"?

Audrina Patridge and Tony Dovolani's paso doble to the Queen hit 'Another One Bites the Dust' on Monday's rock and roll week show sadly turned prophetic.

In a shocking twist, the duo -- despite being in second place -- were eliminated after failing to get enough viewer votes to remain in the competition.

The pair had every reason to believe they'd be called safe after earning an impressive combined total of 32 points on Monday night's performance episode, which included a dance competition segment. They were well ahead of low-scoring couples Kurt Warner and Anna Trebunskaya and Bristol Palin and Mark Ballas.

On 'Good Morning America' (weekdays, 7AM ET on ABC), Audrina Patridge expressed confusion over her surprise elimination from 'Dancing With the Stars.' The star of 'The Hills' and partner Tony Dovolani danced the paso doble on Monday, and received scores high enough to put them in second place.