Datebook: Monday, May 26th ~ 2008
“Dancing with the Stars” has changed ice dancing for me.
Let’s be honest; the costumes were incredible and they were custom made in less than a week. Since we heard the same dance rhythms that we see on the ice each week it became especially hard to seriously consider the soft shoe improvements of a football player and a Latin heartthrob. Kristy, on the other hand, looked natural, albeit without skates on her feet.
Besides the fabulous costumes, the factor that most impressed me was the concept of shared “judging”. The three member judging panel offered their individual critiques and scores each week but the viewing audience then supplemented the scores with their own votes. The audience scoring factor was then the mystery and held the power of elimination of the lowest scoring team.
This concept does give one pause to speculate what would happen if this process were added to some event, say Lake Placid, where the judging panel gets half of the voting privileges and the viewing audience gets the remaining votes. I guess if we had time to organize we could even select a committee of Super Delegates who might even have a bit more power in the voting process, but truthfully that seems a bit too complicated and fraught with improprieties and problems. No, we just need those little electronic boxes that they use on TV shows like “Funniest Home Videos”—the audience votes and it is electronically calculated without the services of Price-Waterhouse. Even if you factor in the skater’s voting family in attendance, the results would self regulate eventually during the process.
This concept of the “Peoples Choice” has certainly been heralded in other genres. There are award shows with numerous acrylic statues offered in tribute. Even if we could not be part of the “real” voting, perhaps we could at least offer one award for each discipline—Novice, Junior, Senior—that reflected the voices of those sitting on the left side of the arena.
I realize that it might take a while for this concept to catch on, so for the first few years we might have to start with the seemingly minor categories that the real judges typically overlook.
For best costuming we might offer then a clear Lucite wallet mounted on a cherry base (symbolically showing there is nothing left in the budget).
For best overall performance we could offer a tinted Lucite Zamboni (logo du jour) that denotes the team that “cleaned up” on the ice.
A trophy of a clear plastic head with a red music note in the middle could be awarded to the team whose music for the year has now been stuck in every viewer’s head and will remain so for a seven month period—probably longer with the added viewing capacity of Ice-network.com.
Of course, even these start-up awards will cost money. So we will need to start fund-raising. Due to logistics we need to rule out candy, candle, and pizza sales. We need to do something at the venue that we will all attend.
That is why I think we need to do our own “Dancing with the Stars” at Lake Placid. We could run a “program dance” night with our own stars—our judges. Funds could be raised by admission to see the event and by those who are willing to pay to “dance” with our “star” judges. I know some rinks do something like this every week where skaters pay five or ten dollars to do a few patterns of a selected dance with a Pro—I guess this is the inflated version of the dime-a-dance program initiated in the 1940s for active duty soldiers.
My own daughter said she would gladly pay to do a few patterns of the “Hickory Hoedown” with John Cole and four patterns of the “Killian” with Bob Horen although she refuses to wear the pink dress again because it is “shortwaisted”. She would also want to waltz with Shawn and Charlie if they had spots available.
Chase Fishpaw would be delighted to take Jenny and Holly around the rink for several Paso or Tango patterns.
Baxter Burbank and Kyle Herring have a few waltzes reserved for some special ladies on panel.
I think you’ll agree this is a goldmine.
And, if we opened our “Star” classification to coaches, well, we would need to go into the wee hours. There are many mothers who have already called me.
If Peter and Sasha are on the dance card we can have those trophies gold-plated.
Mombo
Let’s be honest; the costumes were incredible and they were custom made in less than a week. Since we heard the same dance rhythms that we see on the ice each week it became especially hard to seriously consider the soft shoe improvements of a football player and a Latin heartthrob. Kristy, on the other hand, looked natural, albeit without skates on her feet.
Besides the fabulous costumes, the factor that most impressed me was the concept of shared “judging”. The three member judging panel offered their individual critiques and scores each week but the viewing audience then supplemented the scores with their own votes. The audience scoring factor was then the mystery and held the power of elimination of the lowest scoring team.
This concept does give one pause to speculate what would happen if this process were added to some event, say Lake Placid, where the judging panel gets half of the voting privileges and the viewing audience gets the remaining votes. I guess if we had time to organize we could even select a committee of Super Delegates who might even have a bit more power in the voting process, but truthfully that seems a bit too complicated and fraught with improprieties and problems. No, we just need those little electronic boxes that they use on TV shows like “Funniest Home Videos”—the audience votes and it is electronically calculated without the services of Price-Waterhouse. Even if you factor in the skater’s voting family in attendance, the results would self regulate eventually during the process.
This concept of the “Peoples Choice” has certainly been heralded in other genres. There are award shows with numerous acrylic statues offered in tribute. Even if we could not be part of the “real” voting, perhaps we could at least offer one award for each discipline—Novice, Junior, Senior—that reflected the voices of those sitting on the left side of the arena.
I realize that it might take a while for this concept to catch on, so for the first few years we might have to start with the seemingly minor categories that the real judges typically overlook.
For best costuming we might offer then a clear Lucite wallet mounted on a cherry base (symbolically showing there is nothing left in the budget).
For best overall performance we could offer a tinted Lucite Zamboni (logo du jour) that denotes the team that “cleaned up” on the ice.
A trophy of a clear plastic head with a red music note in the middle could be awarded to the team whose music for the year has now been stuck in every viewer’s head and will remain so for a seven month period—probably longer with the added viewing capacity of Ice-network.com.
Of course, even these start-up awards will cost money. So we will need to start fund-raising. Due to logistics we need to rule out candy, candle, and pizza sales. We need to do something at the venue that we will all attend.
That is why I think we need to do our own “Dancing with the Stars” at Lake Placid. We could run a “program dance” night with our own stars—our judges. Funds could be raised by admission to see the event and by those who are willing to pay to “dance” with our “star” judges. I know some rinks do something like this every week where skaters pay five or ten dollars to do a few patterns of a selected dance with a Pro—I guess this is the inflated version of the dime-a-dance program initiated in the 1940s for active duty soldiers.
My own daughter said she would gladly pay to do a few patterns of the “Hickory Hoedown” with John Cole and four patterns of the “Killian” with Bob Horen although she refuses to wear the pink dress again because it is “shortwaisted”. She would also want to waltz with Shawn and Charlie if they had spots available.
Chase Fishpaw would be delighted to take Jenny and Holly around the rink for several Paso or Tango patterns.
Baxter Burbank and Kyle Herring have a few waltzes reserved for some special ladies on panel.
I think you’ll agree this is a goldmine.
And, if we opened our “Star” classification to coaches, well, we would need to go into the wee hours. There are many mothers who have already called me.
If Peter and Sasha are on the dance card we can have those trophies gold-plated.
Mombo
posted by ice-dance.com @ 6:29 PM
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Although I have had several stories and essays published, I had promised to write my first book if I didn’t get the job. Or finish my already started first book. Or start a second book instead of my unfinished first book.
