Episode 52 Strictly - It Takes Two

Welcome to It Takes Two, our penultimate Tuesday show for you.

Their raunchy rumba almost saw them rumbled, Patrick and Anya are here.

They're hot to foxtrot, Ian and Natalie teach us a ballroom classic.

How gorgeous do they look. Hoping to knock Anton off the top of the

leaderboard, Miss Karen Hauer returns. Hey, hot lips. The other KH

is with us, Karen, with Choreography Corner. How will we get it all in?

This is Strictly: It Takes Two. From London, this is Strictly It

Takes Two. Please welcome your host Zoe Ball.

APPLAUSE Hello, welcome to It Takes Two.

Patrick and Anya's racy rumba certainly got the judges all hot

under the collar, with Len and Bruno almost coming to blows. Despite a

strong performance, they still found themselves in the dance-off. Here's

a reminder of what happened. The hip action was very good, albeit

economical, darling, that's probably a good thing. It was very

understated. You were fan taskically strong framework. The tension

between you and the focus you gave Anya, it was like none of us even

existed in this room. I loved it. The bottom lieb, I thought you did

-- line, I thought you did really well with a dance which is very

difficult for male celebrities. You were intense, you had focus. You

looked after her beautifully. I liked it. Eight. A sexy 10. 9. 9. As

for as I'm concerned, this is one of the trickiest dances, for me to get

one ten - get it! Who will you save? Patrick and Anya. Patrick and Anya.

I have to go with Patrick and Anya. Please welcome Patrick and Anya!

It's so difficult because it's bitter sweet because you have to say

goodbye to Ashley. Congratulations you are the last man standing and

you're into the semifinal. Yes. How are you feeling about that? I'm

feeling pretty good. This is a serious bonus. Well deserved as

well. Fact for you, here, folks, Patrick has matched Harry Judd and

Colin Jackson's high scores of 36 for the rumba, that's the highest

score that the men have got. Wow. Jump back, I want to kick myself. I

know! How proud are you of Patrick? I'm so proud of you, to be honest,

with you it was the hardest dance. It was a challenging week. You gave

me 150% and like Darcey said, there was no-one else existed. Up were

there with me on the dance floor, it was amazing. Which is what you want,

that intensity. I was like that, into the television. Second place on

the swing-a-thon as well. How difficult was it to stand out on the

dance floor? I don't know how you stand out, you just keep going. We

just focussed on each other. We had fun and I kept talking to him and

come on. What's next? Come on, let's do it again. You were out there

about if 18 -- about 18 minutes. Three or four days, it seemed to me.

Joint leaders on the leaderboard and then the viewer vote and you're in

the bottom two. I think everyone who was supporting me felt I was safe

because I was at the top. They went, that's fine, he's cool. I know. They

went down the pub. Great, fine, let's go. You came back fighting in

the dance-off. You really did. Something that I really loved is

when you came out and did the second time, you had taken on board what

Craig said about being softer. I really noticed. Was that

intentional? I kind of just did it again. We had a conversation right

before we had to go on and I said do exactly the same thing, just you and

me. Just you and me and slightly softer. It was. Just do it again. It

was stunning. A lot of disagreement about the rumba between the judges.

We all get confused. It's fantastic. I thought they were going to come to

fisticuffs. Should it be aggressive, romantic? To be honest with you, I

went for the content of the song. The song was beautiful. It was a sad

song. It had a lot of desperation for it and wanting his woman to

stay. I went with the story. Yes, I think it was a bit aggressive at

times, because how else are you going to sell the -- tell the story?

I mean, the basics were there. He told the story. He's an actor. Is

he? ! It's like my interpretation of the passion of the man. So the story

was he's lost his woman and he wants her back. He was desperate. Bruno

said - passion works. Always works for me. For me. I remember that. Of

course, you have to keep four judges happy with whatever you choreograph

and work with the student who won't ever be quiet. It seems that you

have the answer for that. This is good.

Anya's devised a system when I speak during the dance, she said, "Right,

no talking." Every time I do, she fines me 50 p. Slow. # Don't go

back. Money! I'm dizzy. I'm whirling around. I

owe you money. I owe you money. I may owe her around ?9. He owes me

quite a lot. At least ?50. At least. Really? For that day only. That was

week one. Semifinals are here. Two dances for you. Which are you doing

this weekend? We are doing the paso doble and the waltz. I'm excited by

both of those. How is training going so far? Scary. The paso doble is

really tricky for me. At the moment, I'm finding it tricky to do with

connecting it to the music. It's an old track, bit of a classic, and

yeah, it's a bit tricky for me again. I guess you have to start

from scratch. They're so different those dances. You couldn't have two

different, talk about the end of the spectrum, a waltz and paso doble.

How do you teach two dances like that in such a short space of time?

Like Patrick said... (Whip cracking sounds) A little bit of that!

Honestly with the muscle MEP rip with the waltz, we haven't started

actually yet. But I think you will have an easier time. We have to work

on the frame and concentrate on what the judges said before, keep the

frame and just approach the same way we did any other dance and

character, go with his strengths. You do that so well. Have faith.

It's so exciting. Well done. Good luck this week. I'm looking forward

to your paso doble. Patrick and Anya!

APPLAUSE So far in our series of dance

lessons, from the professionals, we've covered the cha cha cha and

waltz. Tonight it's another ballroom classic. You may have seen a foxtrot

performed many times over the years on Strictly, but would you recognise

the basics? It's time to learn the dance step by step.

Groovy. Please welcome It Takes Two's very own Fred and Ginger, Ian

Waite and Natalie Lowe! APPLAUSE

Absolutely stunning. Welcome back. Have a seat. Thank you for that. He

swept me off my feet. He has that way with women. Bless him. That's

nice. Thanknice. Thank you. Lovely to see you dancing again. That's the

first time to dance on telly in ages. Welcome back. Long time

coming. I'm in heels and everything. The foot is heeled. Very, very

exciting. -- healed. Very exciting. Where did the foxtrot come from?

Most people agree it originated in New York in 1914. Ballroom dancing

until then hadn't change since the early waltzes. Then the introduction

of new music, like ragtime changed all of that. The faster music meant

everybody had to dance in hold, much closer together. I like that. Where

did the name come from? The vaudeville actor Harry Fox was seen

foxtrotting to ragtime music in theatre. He lent his name to it. The

Fox trot becomes the foxtrot. How did it make its way into UK

competitions? In 1921 what was then to become the World Dance Council

agreed on the technique and everything of what was then to

become the competitive foxtrot. Basically, what they did was they

took away all the trotting and the skipping and hopping steps and

slowed it down and made it what it is today. It's not really a trot.

It's slightly misleading. Not at all. It's very smooth. Has the

foxtrot had an influence on other dances? The quickstep is actually

based on the foxtrot, it's just a little bit faster with charleston

elements. Also, you will see with American smooth, it's very much

based on the quickstep and foxtrot as well and every now and then you

might see a waltz. I hope you're taking notes at home. To the

untrained eye, the foxtrot could look similar to the waltz, what are

the differences? With the waltz, there's a lot of rise and fall,

which there's not in the foxtrot. And a lot of sway. With the foxtrot

it's a travelling step and flatter. It's a rolls Roy action. -- rolls

rice action. Rols Royce action. Let's take to the floor. You do

quarter turns and there's a rise and fall.

quarter turns and there's a rise and It's a litting. There's a lot of

closing involving. Whereas with the foxtrot, we're doing straight lines.

It's smooth. I could watch that man do that for hours. Me too! I would

rather be in there, though. So graceful. Let's start from the very

beginning. How would you teach beginners how to do that? Because

it's quite a difficult dance to master, actually, the very lower

level. There's a really difficult heel turn in there, what we normally

do in a classroom is start with a slow rhythm. So these are the steps

of the slow rhythm for the man. You go forward on your left foot. Then

your right foot, side clo close, side close. Back on your left foot,

back left, back right and then side close. It's like that. Walk, walk,

side, close, walk. Walk, side close. What about the ladies. I'm going to

turn my back to you. I'm not being rude. Lovely back too. Make sure you

have a flexed knee. That allows you to move more freer. We step back on

the right foot, right, left, side, together, forward right, forward

left, side, together. Then you repeat that. A bit quicker. The

timing is slow, slow, quick, quick, slow. Slow, quick, quick. If you

fought together, it looks like -- if you put this together, it looks like

this? The hold is more casual. It is walk, walk, side close, slow. Slow,

quick, quick, slow. Slow, quick, quick, slow, slow. Shall we add the

music and put us in the mood. Come on everybody. Here we go.

This is how you do it if you're out socially. Then if we turn that into

a classic Ian and Natalie foxtrot, look at that.

APPLAUSE It's beautiful. I've been missing

seeing them together like that. Around she goes! Go on Natalie Lowe!

I'm not at all jealous, I promise (! ) Thank you very much, Ian and

Natalie. By the way, give our love to Mel and Gordon. It's the big

wedding on Friday. Can't wait to see it.

I'm clapping at everything now. Over the last week, we've seen our

normally poise and composed professional dancers descend into a

rabble of drunken sailors, all for a good cause, to set a new world

record. Here's a reminder of how it's done. He's mine now.

This is a challenge to set a Guinness World Record for the most

drunken sailor dance steps in 30 seconds. A drunken sailor is a cross

step behind, a step to the side and then a replacement of weight to the

starting foot. They need to make sure they cross behind and replace

the wieght. Let the battle commence. Thank you, darling. Hoping she

doesn't slip on the poop deck, please welcome Karen!

Hey, crazy legs. Welcome back to the show. We've missed you. First, how

is Kevin after the weekend? He's your boy. He had an emotional

weekend. Is he all right? Yeah, he's doing great. He's smiling. My little

Kevin from Grimsby. Two dances into the semifinal, it's exciting. You

took part in the challenge last year, are you looking forward to

another go at a world record attempt? Definitely. I mean, last

year it was all about the performance and the beauty of

dancing. The technique. Yes, that's what Pasha was saying yesterday.

Look what happened to him. You did a delicate approach to your ball

changes last year. Yeah, it was all about the foot work. This year, it's

about the speed. Yes, I took my vitamins, ate my vegetables and I'm

ready. Good girl. Let's see how Karen did.

Last year was about the sophistication and technique. Not so

much about speed. This year, I'm going to burn the floor. Hello

Karen. Hello. How are you? Nervous. But determined. Please take to the

floor. Thank you. Karen, are you ready? Yes. Richard

are you ready? Never been readier. Are you ready? Very ready. Counting

you down in three, two, one, go! Well done! Take a seat. I think my

bear needs a rest. How was that? Let's do it again! Karen, hooray and

up she rises. That was awesome. Fast and your technique was there. Really

good challenge. Thank you. It was intense. My legs were starting to

burn. My feet were starting to ache a little bit. I was trying to keep a

smile, but trying to enjoy it at the same time. But it was a tough one.

Brilliant! Brilliant technique. I liked your style there. You looked

like you were going seriously fast. I was, I was trying, really, the

panda was trying to help me out. I liked the panda venlt -- panda.

Kevin has taken part. Is there any competition? No. No? Not at all. It

is crunch time after the professionals tackled their drunken

sailors, our adjudicators watched in slow motion to verify every single

one. They had to be accurate. How many do you think you managed?

Hopefully more than my kick ball changes? Fingers crossed. Let's have

a look at the leaderboard as it stands:

up top Anton with 72. Anton! I know. Who would have thought it. He's 83.

Your drunken sailors have been countened and verified. -- counted

and verified. I can reveal that you performed...

68 in 30 seconds. No disqualifications. You're really gob

smacked. Let's look at the leaderboard. You are placed quite

nicely above Aljaz. You're in third place. Take a photograph of it. You

are the highest scoring girl so far. Well done, Karen.

You can find out how Artem got on tomorrow on the show. Give it up for

Karen Hauer. APPLAUSE

Saturday's quarter fiebls saw our celebrities raise their game

further, as well as the spectacular swing-a-thon, here to give us her

expert opinion is Karen Hardy. Welcome, Karen! Hello darling. It's

all getting quite intense, the stakes are high. They all want it.

We're into the semifinals. Let's talk about the weekend. What did you

make of the swing-a-thon? I loved it. It's a real competition. There

is more than one person on the dance floor and for the judges, they can

really assess who the front runners are. Would you have agreed with the

judges in the way they sent them out? Yeah, I think it's down to

those judges. We saw Susanna going out first. I guess, at that moment,

she might have looked the weakest. I thought Abbey went early for me.

Again, this is the judges' moment really. We're seeing them alongside

each other. Let's look at the individual dances. We start with

Patrick and Anya and the rumba. Saved by the judges, a bit of

disagreement from them on Saturday. Should it be romantic, passionate,

aggressive? We've been on this subject before, what's your take?

Really clear. It's up to the individual choreographer how they

depict the song. The song will encourage the emotion of the dance

and then it's relative to the celebrity they have got. I think,

for me, this was a perfect delivery. But it did create some uproar. One

thing I picked up on, which we're going to look at, technically, there

are a couple of things going on down stairs. Look at that great big heel

number one and number two. Len mentioned that. Foot work is the

foundation of movement. But I think, we saw a beautiful dance again from

Patrick here and the delivery of the dance is up to them as a couple to

absolutely sell it. You can convince anybody anything. It's down to them

to sell it. There were some -- was beautiful dancing in that routine.

Have you to convince the judge -- you have to convince the judges and

those at home. Susanna and Kevin and their Argentine tango. Not their

best week. They were at the bottom of the leaderboard. Len said it

lacked food and -- mood and atmosphere. Do you agree? At this

stage of the game, it's because of hidden issues that you get something

like that. There was something pivotal in this perform, the A line,

when we dance the Argentine tango, you really are looking for the lady

to learn how to lean into the man because the weight transition is

different. As much as I really love this choreography, I would have

liked a little more leg decoration and most importantly, that top

A-line. It's almost like their heads are touching. Yes because we want to

show the difference between the international tango and the

Argentine tango. International their heads right out there. With this

one, that could have affected - the judges are looking for a short time.

You want to be nailing these very, very important technical elements.

Natalie and Artem and their paso doble. Len was annoyed because he

said it wasn't traditional enough. Was it traditional enough for you?

I'm confused. The trained eye, it's the trained eye. I'm watching and

thinking, look at this glamorous couple and they go into this move

here, by the time they're into the move, they haven't even touched each

other. My eyes are going, why are they not dancing, ballroom and

Latin, American is about being together. I show that clip, how

powerful they look when you dance with your partner in contact, it

increases the strength of the performance. Now with the paso doble

it's already a very powerful dance. But the step there where she walked

around in a big circle, they could have done a grand circle where

they're in hold and she walks around. I don't know why, big bad

Artem of the choreography again. Again, maybe he's looking to impress

the audience at home. But you have to impress the judges. You want the

scores. It's making all the difference. Also, let's talk about

Craig saying he thought it was too slick. Now people aren't good enough

then he's telling Natalie it's too good. What did you make of that

snrvelingts We teach our students it's about the lines and the beauty

of the lines. We know, Natalie can do the arms and she did the two of

them, perfected it. You could argue it was slightly too clean. From that

element, I actually loved it. I think they nailed that. I don't know

where - they were really nit picking. Tough on them on Saturday.

They're strong. They'll fight on. Abbey and Aljaz and the Viennese

waltz. Len says one or two issues with foot work. He didn't have time

to get into them. Did you notice? Yes, straight away. Before we want

to nit pick again. We are nit picking on these couples. This was

sensational. The top line that we've talked about, look at it, the body

contact, the head, absolutely. What did I see? Toes all the way through.

Generally when the lady is driving a forward step she wants to take a

strong heel lead. It's very difficult, when you are in a high

heel for a lady. Early on with our beginners or celebrities, they tend

to toe dance. When you toe dance, the movement is different. It would

have been nice and what Len was after was a strong heel lead and it

would have given strength and character to the dance. Will have

taken that on board. Sophie and Brendan and the tango. Bruno called

it an unexpected treat of a tango. It was beautiful. A lady that's

showing us improvement. We wanted character from this lady and she

delivered it. What we're seeing here is the strong head fix. I've picked

up on what the judges talk about, the arms are beginning to get loose.

The top line breaks again. All before that, she was brilliant. She

held that top line, her head was out very nicely. But again, you have to

maintain these things from a minute-and-a-half. In general,

beautiful. She's ticking the boxes. What they ask for, she she delivers.

They're talking about the V shape which was lacking, is that the head

position? Well done. That's what we were saying earlier. In the

international style the head goes right out, the arm over the back of

the gentleman's arm, down in those knees. There's a big oversway image

there. The Argentine tango and the whole lot comes in and we close the

frame. I like it. Semifinals next. Now, if you look back at the

beginning of the competition, are the five couples here at the end of

you would have thought would be here? You know what, it's easy for

me to say, yes, they're all the ones. I think there would have been

one change. I don't think I would have seen Patrick stay in -- staying

the test of time. He's proven to me, he's digging in and staying there. I

think I would have thought Ashley would stay there by now. Other than

that, yes, those are left. I like it when people surprise you like that.

They're tackling two dances this week. You've been there as the

professional with a celebrity, how difficult is it at this point, this

many weeks, in everyone is getting tired and emotional, they want to

win, to learn two dances and do them to perfection. I'm not going to lie

again, it's gruelling. It's torturous. The aim of the game is to

make it look beautiful. The body will be exhausted. It will be down

to stamina. Not for the muscles. They know what they have to do. It's

snap that of the mind. -- snap that of the mind -- stamina of the mind.

Land in the dance-off, make a mistake and it could be the end of

you. Focus on keeping the mind alive and think two more weekends left.

That's all it is. Think about the trophy. I love you, you're adorable,

Karen Hardy! Thank you to all my guests tonight. Tomorrow

swing-a-thon champs Natalie and Artem are here. We have the latest

instalment of the pro-challenge and Ian Waite with a bumper Wednesday

Warm-Up. See you tomorrow.