Dancing with the Stars – why do we still love it after all these seasons?
I saw a commercial yesterday announcing that the new cast for season 7 of Dancing With The Stars will be revealed in August. I’m very excited to find out what celebrities will be competing, and also if my favorite professional dancers (like Mark Ballas and Jonathan Roberts) will be on the show too.
I started to think about the show, how I’ve watched it since the very first show. I remember it clearly – it was a Wednesday night and I had just gotten home from a seminar. I went into my room to iron clothes for work the next day and by luck ABC was the channel on my television. I was half watching it when I heard Evander Holyfield announced as a dancer. This piqued my curiosity. What kind of show would have a professional champion boxer dancing? He was wearing a yellow shirt and dancing with Edyta Sliwinska.
So here’s my question of the day – why is Dancing With the Stars still so popular after all these seasons?
Many shows have come and gone since that first episode and I would argue the show is even more popular today than it was during the first season. Maybe we like it so much because as fans we feel we get to know the celebrities and their professional partners. We see the behind the scenes footage from the first meeting to the first few weeks of rehearsals. We see the mess ups, mistakes, and arguments as the celebrities work with the pros. While some editing has to take place with the footage, I believe it’s a pretty good snapshot of the partnership. I’ve seen some happy moments and some not so happy moments during the first few seasons.
Maybe the show is still popular because the producers have made some good choices in picking the celebrities. I mean who would have though that NFL stars like Jerry Rice or Emmet Smith would even be on the show, let alone do as well as they did. And then there are the celebrities that are not the best dancers – like Jerry Springer and Billy Ray Cyrus – who make it pretty far into the competition based on fan support. That’s the beauty of the show – the fans have a say. The expert judges do as well, but if enough people like a star and vote for them we can save them from elimination – if only for a few weeks.
Finally I think this show is one that can appeal to a wide audience. There is no “typical” DWTS fan. I love the show, my mother loves it, my husband watches it too and I’ve been to parties or whatever where all kinds of people are talking about it. During the season there are tons of questions on sites like Yahoo!Answers about dance performances, musical guests, or songs that were played. And you can watch this show with your kids without too much of a worry that they’ll hear or see something inappropriate. I mean there wasn’t too much Kelly Monaco could do about her wardrobe malfunction in season 1, and I did see Marissa Jaret Winokur mouth an obscenity once on the show but for the most part you can feel safe letting your children watch the show.
That being said, I can’t wait to find out who will be competing in Season 7 of Dancing with the Stars!
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