By: Sarah Wolfenden | Staff Writer
Dedication night on Dancing With the Stars is a crowd favorite and a guaranteed tear jerker. It’s a staple in the lineup every season as the stars take a night to dedicate a dance, and a week to someone or something special, supportive, or guiding in their journey. This week we saw dedications to friends, family, costars who had passed, and even whole countries. But looming in the back of many avid viewers’ minds was one question. “What is happening with Val Chmerkovskiy and Jenna Dewan?”
For some context: last Tuesday, October 13, was Super Bowl Night. All of the stars and pros performed to famous previous halftime shows, and had costumes and sets modeled after their productions. That night Harry Shum Jr., with his partner Jenna Johnson-Chmerkovskiy performed a Samba to Usher’s “Yeah!” Sitting judge, Carrie Ann Inaba, who has been judging since 2005, made a comment to Jenna about including a lift in a style that does not allow lifting. Jenna was unclear about where the lift was, as the guidelines for what counts as lifting are unclear. Harry had been lifted by members of the troupe, but in seasons past that had flown as not counting, because it wasn’t a member of the pair who had done the lifting. There was also a small trick where both of Jenna’s feet had come off the floor, but that was a slip in a step where in rehearsals it had not been in a lift.
Instead of clarifying where the lift was, Inaba read off the definition of a lift, in an abrasive tone, followed by “Yeah, lift.” Before dropping the paper back to the judges table.
Val Chmerkovskiy, Jenna’s husband and fellow pro dancer on the show, took to Instagram and made disparaging comments towards Carrie Ann in the form of a story post. The exact quote or post can not be found as it was removed from socials shortly after posting, but it has been referred to as the “Will Smith slap joke” as he reportedly referenced the Will Smith Oscars incident where the host had made comments about Smith’s wife causing Smith to go on stage and slap the host in retaliation.
Chmerkovskiy followed the post with an apology and clarification of his intentions, but that isn’t the end of the story. The following day, it was announced that Val was suspended for the week and Alan Bersten, a pro on Dancing With the Stars who had been eliminated with his partner Giada DeLaurentis on week two of this season, would be subbing for him for the week. Bersten has subbed for Val, his brother and former pro Maks Chmerkovskiy, as well as current pro Mark Ballas on other occasions due to injury, illness, and a reported “chemistry issue” between Maks and one of his partners, however this suspension of a pro, especially due to behavior towards a judge, is the first of its kind.
The final controversy, before the show begins, comes back to Instagram. Social media was in an uproar because an unidentified user checked Chmerkovskiy’s following category, and found he was not following Bersten, or his girlfriend and fellow pro Emma Slater. This was quickly debunked as not in any way targeted. Val uses his social media fairly minimally and has never followed Bersten or Slater, nor a handful of other pros on the show, who are unrelated to the controversy.
The night of the show comes around, it is Tuesday at 8 and viewers are in front of their screens waiting for the show to start. The episode opens with announcing the stars, what they are known for, their partners, and the order of the show (Ex: “Olympic gold medalist, with her Partner Pasha Pashkov, it’s Amber Glenn,” and the pairs are announced in the order that they are performing). Jenna Dewan, Val’s partner, is announced as “Film and TV star, with her partner Alan Bersten, it’s Jenna Dewan.” The repairing is not addressed until the end of introductions, at which point host Alfonso says “Val is not with us this week” with no other context as to why Bersten and Dewan are paired together.
Dewan’s performance was set to air around the middle of the show. Each pair’s performance opens with a package, in which they show behind the scenes footage. Dewan’s package opened at 6:10 pm on Friday, where the packages don’t usually address when the pair start rehearsing. Alan and Jenna are sitting on the couch, vaguely talking about unforeseen circumstances. The package also presents as though Bersten choreographed their entire number. There is no way to know for certain if Alan is 100% responsible for the work, or if Val had started a number and Jenna, having previous dance experience, was able to fill Alan in where Val left off, and Bersten finished the job. The choreography felt reminiscent of Bersten’s choreography from previous seasons, there was a lightness and ease to it, where Chmerkovskiy’s work tends to swing more intense. Either way, there is no way to know for certain.
The voting site, abc.com, also changed the profile to vote for Jenna. ABC had edited together photos of Dewan and Bersten to make it seem as though they were paired from the start.
Carrie Ann, usually known as one of the more inconsistent judges, also seemed to be on her best behavior. She called out a lift from a different pairing, but in a very restrained manner, and scored Dewan and Bersten, as well as Shum and Johnson-Chmerkovskiy evenly and fairly, and complimented Johnson-Chmerkovskiy on her choreography and “integrat[ing] the elements of the foxtrot.” Dewan even got her first ten of the season, and it came from Inaba.
The final (answered) question of the night was eliminations. Fortunately for the cast, the drama fell on elimination night. This doesn’t happen every season, but in the past few years it has become more and more common, where no one will be eliminated due to the emotional nature of the episode. Audiences were speculating that Val would have a one week suspension, then during his suspended week his team would be eliminated by production. This was not the case, as everyone is returning for the next episode.
ABC has confirmed that Chmerkovskiy will be back for Halloween Night, and Alan will be back in his position as eliminated pro. There are still some hanging questions regarding his status. Will him and Jenna be eliminated the following week, will Val be invited back next season? That all hangs in the balance.
Photos provided by abc.com
