Emmitt Smith has the ‘Dancing’ spirit

Bringing up the rear
A level below those two was country singer Sara Evans, who looked uncomfortable with partner Tony Dovolani. Dovolani was matched with natural talent Stacy Keibler last time around, and for those who found him to be a bit of an unctuous boob, there’s some satisfaction in seeing him struggle with a plain old ordinary person like Evans. Dovolani can try to transform her into a “lioness,” as he put it, but so far, judge Bruno compared her instead to Barbara Bush. They did an unromantic and uninspiring foxtrot to Barry Manilow’s unromantic and uninspiring “Mandy,” continuing the show’s tradition of challenging the dancers with totally inappropriate and often very bad music.

Filling the role of the aging goofball, occupied last year by George Hamilton, was Jerry Springer, who made a point of publicly promising to be terrible before the premiere. Surprisingly, Springer wasn’t entirely incompetent. He moved his feet in a pattern related to the sounds being produced by the band, and while he had a few choreography lapses, he certainly put more oomph into it than, say, Harry Hamlin.

Bringing up the rear was Tucker Carlson, who was genuinely dreadful. How bad was he? He remained seated during the first 25 percent or so of the performance while his partner danced around. Could not be trusted, apparently, to competently stand still without lowering the score. Once he stood up, as one judge pointed out, it got worse. His feet barely moved, he had little sense of where the beat was, and there was the uncomfortable sense throughout that he found the entire thing hilariously below his notice. If any of this is sounding familiar, it should. You may have thought you’d go a lifetime without hearing it, but here it is: Tucker Carlson is the new Master P.

Linda Holmes is a writer in Bloomington, Minn.

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