‘Dancing with the Stars’ season 17 spotlight. Bill Engvall and Emma Slater
If there is one thing we’ve learned about male comedians on “Dancing with the Stars” over the years, it’s this: They are traditionally pretty awful. Just ask Jeffrey Ross or D.L. Hughley how they fared on the show. While they may be solid entertainers, there is really not much of anything that doing standup has in common with dance. When you are so used to just standing in one place, it’s pretty hard to get yourself accustomed to moving around and having to keep your mouth shut.
Now, we turn to Bill Engvall, whose greatest asset right now is simply that he has a devoted following among “Blue Collar Comedy Tour” fans. He’s the only person among the cast that we have actually interviewed at some point in our career, and we really like him as a guy. We just don’t think he will be much of a dancer.
Professional partner – Emma Slater. This is not going to help Bill out much. No one has ever heard of Emma outside of the ballroom family, so there’s no predetermined following there. Her best hope is going to be like how Sharna Burgess struck gold with Andy Dick last year since he was instantly likable, and she pushes him while laughing at his jokes. (We do love the expression that she has in the photo.)
Strengths – For Bill, the biggest one her is that he knows how to entertain people. Even if he’s an awful dancer (which we expect him to be), he’s going to make people happy to have him on the show. This is always a nice strategy if you just want to make it on the show for a few weeks. Also, we know that the folks in the midwest who love him will be angling to support him.
Weaknesses – Well, there are many. He’s one of the older guys this season, he’s got no real experience in this at all, and we don’t even know if he has any rhythm. There is a certain point in the season where being funny really doesn’t get you anywhere, since the judges bury you with bad scores.
Prediction – Bill won’t be the first person out, unless he just gets the worst score by a pretty wide margin. The more likely scenario here is that he makes it a couple of weeks and then gets sent home when it’s obvious that there are better dancers in the competition. That’s probably best for the show, as well, since getting some of that funny energy in here is always welcome when there are others who take this so seriously.
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Photo: ABC