  Cheryl Burke and Drew Lachey were two of the Dancing With the Stars celebrities at Scotiabank Place last night. (File photo) |
OTTAWA - The Dancing with the Stars tour swept through Scotiabank Place last night, bringing a kind of over-the-top glitz and glamour with it the place has likely never seen before.
Some 4,300 people turned out to see the two-hour touring version of ABC's top reality show, now heading into its fifth season, where the dancers and B and C-listers who made it a hit strutted their stuff.
The floor of the stadium resembled a real ballroom dancing area, with bar tables set up around the large floor. A live six-piece band and several singers performed every song, a big screen featuring everything happening on the floor larger than life.
Then the likes of Joey Fatone, Drew Lachey, Joey McIntyre and ]oey Lawrence proceeded to recreate their magic formula with competitive dancers who made them look even more practiced than on the small screen.
The centrepiece of the two-hour evening was, of course, the women, resplendent in their vast array of multi-coloured, bedazzled dresses with daring cutaways, their skin looking fresh from the Mystic Tan booth.
After each number the male star and his dancers would do a little back-and-forth breathless banter, their faces glistening from the workout they'd just been through.
We learned Cheryl Burke, who won back-to-back seasons with Lachey and football player Emmitt Smith, was so shy when she first met Lachey she could barely look at him.
Lawrence, who accentuated his big-gun biceps with decorative straps, is fresh off a Broadyway run "getting my Fosse on eight days a week" in Chicago.
And during their time on season three, his partner Edyta Sliwinska was fond of saying "it's a cup of cake," so he helped her learn English while she made him a better dancer.
The natural ham Fatone seemed the most entertaining of the celebs to watch.
"It wasn't that long ago," he said, chest heaving.
"But I'm tired. I gotta stop eating that stuff backstage."
Aussie Dancing With the Stars winner Kym Johnson needled him further.
"We can't all be Justin Timberlake," she said. "Funny," he teased back.
They played to an eager crowd, either fans of the show, ballroom dancing itself, with a few Blossom and 'N Sync die-hards thrown in. The crowd ate up an extensive blooper reel. And every so often a dance would be punctuated with a feverish scream of "we love you!" from somewhere up in the 200s.
Though the celebrities were fun to watch, it was clear their talented partners were making them look much better than they could ever be. The best moments happened every time five or six of the company couples -- including Burke, Sliwinska and Johnson -- banded together with male career dancers to do an upbeat jive or glamorous waltz.
There were loads of cheesy moments -- Lachey and Burke, a cape and the Paso Doble, for instance -- but there were enough exuberant steps and jumps to make them seem another fun part of the show.
As an added bonus, the evening was also to feature a local dance competition between four "pro-am" couples -- a professional paired with an amateur -- plucked from Ottawa.
