Orchestra night on Dancing with the Stars (RTÉ One, Sunday) comes with strings attached for comedian Gearóid Farrelly who is the latest celebrity to exit the contest. He and pro partner Stephen Vincent lose a white-knuckle dance-off against Mr Brown’s Boys actor Danny O’Carroll and Salome Chachua, holding their nerve jiving to All Night Long by Lionel Richie (insert your own joke about “Say you, say Salome”).
Farrelly, by contrast, is overcome with nerves during his Charleston. “I screwed up and never recovered,” he says after receiving a clean sweep of thumbs down from the judges.
With just a few episodes to go, the stakes have never been higher and the episode is an agreeable blend of sweat, tension and hauteur on the dance-floor. And with most of the duff dancers gone – the exception is chef Kevin Dundon who continues to defy gravity like a Michelin-star restaurant in a recession – the standard is generally high as the RTÉ Concert Orchestra pops along too add live accompaniment.
Still, you can see how it’s all going to shake out. As the final looms, the competition is looking more and more like a battle of the Olympians, with gold medallist Rhys McClenaghan neck and neck against taekwondo champion Jack Woolley.
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Bragging rights this week go to McClenaghan. Dancing with Lara Nolan, he tops the leader board with a near perfect 39 for his contemporary ballroom dance to Bittersweet Symphony by The Verve. “Your lifts were seamless,” says Arthur Gourounlian. “A very powerful piece of music,” adds Loraine Barry, “You had to deliver a powerful performance to balance that – that’s exactly what you did.”
In second place, Woolley and Alex Vladimirov score 37 for their Ricky Martin-soundtracked samba. But it’s the threads rather than the twirls that grab the attention. Woolley is done up in a feathery outfit that looks like a skinned Sesame Street puppet – prompting Brian Redmond to ponder where he found socks to match.
With the exception of ace pratfaller Dundon, everyone left is approaching the contest with deathly seriousness. O’Carroll, for instance, is so locked into DWTS that he’s prepared to go where other Mrs Brown’s Boys stars might fear to venture. “It’s all about the ass ... can I say that?” he declares of his salsa. “You just did,” shoots back presenter Jennifer Zamparelli.
Next week, it’s yet another themed episode: “country night”. But why stop at country: why not a show devoted to goth? Darkwave? Hair metal? The possibilities are endless – though not for Gearóid Farrelly, a funny man who must cry the tears of a clown as the exit music finally plays.
