Speaker 1: Hello from home once again.
Speaker 2: I am Danielle Fischel, podcaster, TV director, mother of two,
Speaker 2: and even at spelling Bees. I am topa NNGA from
Speaker 2: the nineties family sitcom Boy Meets World. But in twenty
Speaker 2: twenty five, I was a contestant on season thirty four
Speaker 2: of Dancing with the Stars.
Speaker 1: I am just off the press.
Speaker 2: Line for Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Night, despite
Speaker 2: having no prior dance experience and the fact that the
Speaker 2: last time I danced in public may have been at
Speaker 2: my wedding, which was seven years ago.
Speaker 1: Tonight, by the way.
Speaker 2: Here, I am back in my house after making it
Speaker 2: to the final eight. Throughout this entire experience, I have
Speaker 2: continued to record this here podcast, sharing every detail and
Speaker 2: behind the scenes story with you as I fought my
Speaker 2: way through a slayer like mosh pit of talented dancers
Speaker 2: and explosive personalities, all in the hopes of winning Elen
Speaker 2: Goodman Mirror Ball Trophy. As you are probably aware at
Speaker 2: this point, I tonight was my last night, was my
Speaker 2: last dance. I was eliminated, and.
Speaker 1: I have such a wide range of emotions.
Speaker 2: I'm obviously very sad to be leaving the competition. I'm
Speaker 2: sad to have my day to day life is going
Speaker 2: to so drastically change now. I have literally woken up
Speaker 2: every single day and looked forward to rehearsal and looked
Speaker 2: forward to what dance we were learning that week, and
Speaker 2: to seeing Pasha and collaborating with him and hanging out
Speaker 2: with him. Talking about not seeing him every day is
Speaker 2: going to make me very sad. We had the most
Speaker 2: dream like partnership you could possibly ask for. With someone
Speaker 2: that you get thrown together with, you have no idea
Speaker 2: what you're in for when you know, you throw yourself
Speaker 2: into something so wholeheartedly and something that's going to be
Speaker 2: so much a part of your life. And same for him,
Speaker 2: you know.
Speaker 1: This is.
Speaker 2: This is his livelihood, this is something he's been, he's
Speaker 2: you know, he's a professional dancer for his entire life,
Speaker 2: and every year he puts himself out there and has
Speaker 2: no idea who he's going to get and you never
Speaker 2: know how you know, personalities, mesh, I think I am
Speaker 2: comfortable speaking for both of us when I say it
Speaker 2: couldn't have gone any better. I'm so lucky, just so
Speaker 2: so so lucky that Pasha is my partner.
Speaker 1: He was truly the best.
Speaker 2: And with him, of course came Danny, his wife, who
Speaker 2: I just I'm completely obsessed with as well, and I love,
Speaker 2: and their daughter Kiki, who I'm so lucky loves me
Speaker 2: and wants to hang out with me and lets me
Speaker 2: hold her, and just I just love their family so much,
Speaker 2: so talking about him and not seeing him and them
Speaker 2: every day is going to take some getting used to.
Speaker 2: I really didn't want to cry this early on in
Speaker 2: the podcast because overall, I feel so extremely positive about
Speaker 2: everything we did, and it would be a lot harder
Speaker 2: to be walking away from the show. If I could
Speaker 2: look back and say, oh, you know, I think maybe
Speaker 2: I got eliminated because I didn't put in the extra
Speaker 2: work here, or because I didn't try hard here, or
Speaker 2: because you know, some some reason, like there was something
Speaker 2: I could point to, then maybe I would feel worse.
Speaker 2: But we did every single thing we possibly could with
Speaker 2: what we've had available to us. Where there're songs we
Speaker 2: wanted that we didn't get that didn't clear. Sure were
Speaker 2: their theme nights that you know, didn't necessarily speak to us,
Speaker 2: but we had to give it our all anyway, of course,
Speaker 2: all of those things, I mean, even for example, you know,
Speaker 2: with tonight's dance the contemporary, which we were able to
Speaker 2: do to dream On by Aerosmith, which was such a
Speaker 2: dream come true for both of us, Like Pasha and I.
Speaker 1: Just love that song and.
Speaker 2: It was very very special to both of us, so
Speaker 2: we were really excited about that. But we got the
Speaker 2: song cleared and we knew we were going to be
Speaker 2: able to do our contemporary to dream On right away.
Speaker 2: Pasha was like, what's the story you want to tell?
Speaker 2: What does this mean to you? You know, contemporary is
Speaker 2: a very personal dance. It's usually about something, it's got
Speaker 2: some emotion. And he said, what is it about? And
Speaker 2: I said, I know the song like the back of
Speaker 2: my hand, but I'm going to listen to it again
Speaker 2: and see what speaks to me. And I listened to
Speaker 2: it quite a few times, back to back to back,
Speaker 2: and I wrote to Pasha. I said, Okay, our story
Speaker 2: is about the impossible standards placed on women, both from
Speaker 2: society and from ourselves. If we pursue work outside the
Speaker 2: home and have a family, we're told that we should
Speaker 2: be with our kids more. If we stay home, we're
Speaker 2: told we don't work and are uninteresting. If we're too thin,
Speaker 2: we're told to eat a burger, and if we gain weight,
Speaker 2: we're told to get off the couch. When we get
Speaker 2: botox or fillers, we're accused of not aging gracefully. And
Speaker 2: when we age naturally, we're called old and ugly. We
Speaker 2: are somehow always too much and never enough at the
Speaker 2: same time. And the only cure for it is to
Speaker 2: live life your way, living out your dreams, because, as
Speaker 2: my cancer diagnosis pointed out to me last year, life
Speaker 2: is short and we never know when we're living our
Speaker 2: last day or dancing our last dance.
Speaker 1: And he right.
Speaker 2: Away like wrote, love it, that's it great, this is
Speaker 2: going to help me choreograph the whole thing, and he did.
Speaker 2: He went and choreographed it. And Pasha is a really
Speaker 2: skilled dancer in all ballroom and Latin dances, he doesn't
Speaker 2: feel as comfortable with contemporary dances in choreography, so he
Speaker 2: worked with two people that he knows, loves and trusts,
Speaker 2: that are absolute experts in contemporary and he worked with
Speaker 2: them to put together the dance that spoke to exactly
Speaker 2: what I wrote in my text, the societal pressure and
Speaker 2: outside noise and judgments and all of that. And then tonight,
Speaker 2: while we were on the ballroom floor. I was like
Speaker 2: listening to my package and I was like, none of
Speaker 2: that was even mentioned, Like none of my story was
Speaker 2: even in the package. And we don't have any you know,
Speaker 2: those are just things that are completely out of our control,
Speaker 2: Like we don't have we don't get to see the package,
Speaker 2: we don't get to have notes on the package, we
Speaker 2: don't get to have we don't know, we don't know
Speaker 2: what's in there.
Speaker 1: So, yeah, are there things that.
Speaker 2: I can look back on and say, like, maybe if
Speaker 2: those things had been different, the outcome could be different.
Speaker 2: But I have not one thing about this experience that
Speaker 2: I look back on and think to myself, Oh, I
Speaker 2: regret this moment because I gave it my all.
Speaker 1: I really really did.
Speaker 2: And no one gave it. I mean, Pasha gave it
Speaker 2: his all plus some.
Speaker 1: I mean Pasha is.
Speaker 2: He is just the hardest working person and he was
Speaker 2: working all hours and just doing his absolute best. And
Speaker 2: so there's nothing, there's nothing I would change about the
Speaker 2: entire experience, not one thing. There's nothing I could There's
Speaker 2: nothing I could do. And if this is where the
Speaker 2: journey ends, and it is, really I'm really proud.
Speaker 1: I'm really proud. I look back on every week.
Speaker 2: As like a special, individual, unique little moment in time
Speaker 2: that I'll remember forever. On top of having the contemporary
Speaker 2: dance this week, it was also team dance week, and
Speaker 2: if there was ever a time to have to be
Speaker 2: eliminated in the competition, I think after that team dance is.
Speaker 1: The time to do it.
Speaker 2: You saw us all celebrating after the dance ended. Every
Speaker 2: single second of that dance was hard earned. You know,
Speaker 2: we only had a total of seven hours as a
Speaker 2: group to put that together, and so our pros had
Speaker 2: to choreograph it and teach it to us, and we
Speaker 2: had to.
Speaker 1: Nail it in seven hours.
Speaker 2: And that's not seven hours even in one day. That's
Speaker 2: seven hours broken up into two days. It was two
Speaker 2: different rehearsal times, and then of course we had our
Speaker 2: camera blocking, and then today we were able to kind
Speaker 2: of like, all right, we've got ten minutes, let's try
Speaker 2: to rehearse some moments. And yeah, I mean, it was
Speaker 2: such a fun week watching the pros work and watching
Speaker 2: them trust and respect each other and collaborate and truly
Speaker 2: all week, best idea wins. Anyone who had an idea,
Speaker 2: anyone who had a suggestion of the pros the celebs
Speaker 2: were not necessarily lobbing suggestions, but we were comfortable to say, like,
Speaker 2: this doesn't feel right, is there something else we could
Speaker 2: do here, or just even just asking all the questions
Speaker 2: like what are we supposed to be doing when we
Speaker 2: do this? But it was such a great week and truly,
Speaker 2: like right up until the last second, I was like,
Speaker 2: there was like right before we started where I was like,
Speaker 2: oh my gosh, my brain is like melting and I
Speaker 2: couldn't get this one part, and I was like, we
Speaker 2: need to start again, and we started again, and then
Speaker 2: I really feel like we killed it. I mean, it
Speaker 2: was just so much fun, and because we only had
Speaker 2: seven hours, and because there were so many different moving parts,
Speaker 2: and because then you're dealing with all the cameras and
Speaker 2: where the camera's going to be and what are you
Speaker 2: supposed to do? And we can't see each other, and
Speaker 2: you know, Alfonso's having to run out. He's like off
Speaker 2: on the side and then he has to run out,
Speaker 2: and we had to you know, have our backs to
Speaker 2: Alfonso for that part, the celeb part where the pros
Speaker 2: aren't allowed to be on the floor with us and everyone,
Speaker 2: all the pros asked Whitney. They were like, who's going
Speaker 2: to count? I just someone needs to count so that
Speaker 2: we can make sure we're all together, because nobody cares
Speaker 2: if you're counting as long as you all look together. Like, yeah,
Speaker 2: go ahead, it out so you know you're on the
Speaker 2: right counts. And Whitney was like, I know the counts.
Speaker 2: I will count. And so Whitney took it on herself
Speaker 2: to be the leader there for all of us to
Speaker 2: make sure we were all on and she.
Speaker 1: Did that at the request of our pros. And you know,
Speaker 1: Whitney is.
Speaker 2: Gosh, I can say so many wonderful things about every
Speaker 2: single person on this cast. Whitney is the first person.
Speaker 1: To say I can do this.
Speaker 2: Do you want me to do this? Can I take
Speaker 2: on this? Can I take this on? Can I how
Speaker 2: can I help? What can I do?
Speaker 1: And oh, I'm gonna start crying again.
Speaker 2: And this past week that was really difficult for me
Speaker 2: with the contemporary dance. Whitney was one of the first
Speaker 2: people I reached out to. It was Mark. I texted
Speaker 2: Whitney and I said, I'm having a really hard time
Speaker 2: this week and she said, down, you know, talk to me,
Speaker 2: And we ended up sending each other voice notes back
Speaker 2: and forth, and she was really God, she's good people,
Speaker 2: really good people. I'm going to miss her. I'm gonna
Speaker 2: miss Jordan so much too. Of course, I'm gonna miss
Speaker 2: my boy Dylan, my alliance partner from day one. I
Speaker 2: almost feel as bad that I let Dylan down as
Speaker 2: much as I did Pasha. It's funny like I apologize
Speaker 2: to Pasha. I said, I'm sorry I didn't get us
Speaker 2: to the finals, and he apologized. He said, no, I'm
Speaker 2: sorry I didn't get us to the finals. I was like, no, no, no, no,
Speaker 2: this is on me, not on you. I kind of
Speaker 2: feel the same way about Dylan. I feel like I
Speaker 2: let our alliance down. Oh my gosh.
Speaker 1: And Robert. Robert and I both got super emotional saying
Speaker 1: goodbye to each other.
Speaker 2: We all did. I'm gonna miss Alex, I'm gonna miss Andy,
Speaker 2: I'm goin to miss Elane. I'm truly I'm gonna miss everybody,
Speaker 2: such a good group. I didn't even name all the
Speaker 2: pros because honestly, I'd just be sitting here saying I'm
Speaker 2: gonna miss every single person. I'm gonna miss the troops
Speaker 2: so much. They called me like a troop mom.
Speaker 1: This is what I felt like.
Speaker 2: I felt like, I felt like their troop mom. I'm
Speaker 2: so proud of them. I just cheer them on every
Speaker 2: single week. I'm still gonna be doing that, just gonna
Speaker 2: be cheering them on from home, which honestly.
Speaker 1: Kind of looking forward to.
Speaker 2: I'm also really looking forward to washing my feet because
Speaker 2: I still haven't washed my feet from it. I was
Speaker 2: barefoot all night, which is just disgusting. We will be
Speaker 2: taping a live episode of Danielle with at Disney California
Speaker 2: Adventure Park on December fourth, twenty twenty five. If you
Speaker 2: live in the Southern California area or if you can
Speaker 2: be in the Southern California area on December fourth, we
Speaker 2: have an opportunity for you to join us. Between now
Speaker 2: and November twenty fourth of twenty twenty five, you can
Speaker 2: enter for your chance to win tickets to attend the
Speaker 2: Coast one oh three point five Private Holiday Party at
Speaker 2: Disney California Adventure Park on December fourth, twenty twenty five,
Speaker 2: including an overnight stay at the Disneyland Resort Hotel for
Speaker 2: a family of four and two day one park per
Speaker 2: day tickets to Disneyland Park or Disney California Adventure Park. Plus,
Speaker 2: you will have the chance to meet us while we
Speaker 2: are taping an episode of Danielle With inside Disney California
Speaker 2: Adventure Park.
Speaker 1: Visit Coast one oh.
Speaker 2: Three five dot com forward slash Danielle With now to
Speaker 2: enter for your chance to win. So one of the
Speaker 2: reasons this was a really a hard week for me
Speaker 2: is that, you know, we were dancing at contemporary, and
Speaker 2: now that I'm not on the show anymore, I feel
Speaker 2: really comfortable saying I don't like it.
Speaker 1: I don't like contemporary. I just no, just no, It's
Speaker 1: it's a no from me, dog. I don't like it.
Speaker 1: I don't like it at all.
Speaker 2: I like being in a frame, which is weird. I
Speaker 2: didn't think I was gonna like that when I first
Speaker 2: joined the show. I thought I'm only gonna like Latin
Speaker 2: dances and I'm probably gonna like this jazz number and
Speaker 2: a contemporary.
Speaker 1: And uh, you know what, it's really not for me.
Speaker 2: I have realized that my neck is significantly longer than
Speaker 2: I thought it was, now that I have learned how
Speaker 2: to keep my shoulders down, and now that my shoulders
Speaker 2: are down, I love being in a frame. It's so nice.
Speaker 2: It's so comforting. And when you have a good part
Speaker 2: like I did with Pasha, being in that frame and
Speaker 2: having that connection is just really feels great. It feels
Speaker 2: really nice, and it feels beautiful. And then Contemporary felt
Speaker 2: very like the opposite of everything I had worked so
Speaker 2: hard for. It was like, Okay, have a gut punch
Speaker 2: and be like a rag doll and have loose fingers
Speaker 2: and no broken wrists and you know, straight arms, but
Speaker 2: still loosey, goosey fingers, And it just felt very opposite
Speaker 2: of everything I had been doing. And also, I have
Speaker 2: a very flexible spine. But I'm very flexible and my
Speaker 2: spine like going back, like I could do a lot
Speaker 2: of backbends. And that's why you saw Pasha and I
Speaker 2: do a lot of dips and back bend style stuff
Speaker 2: because he knew it was easy for me and looks good,
Speaker 2: and so we capitalized on that as often as we could.
Speaker 2: But the shortest part of my body, you know, five
Speaker 2: to one, the shortest part of my body is my waist.
Speaker 2: My torso is literally like two and a half inches long.
Speaker 2: Like from my lowest rim to my hip bone is
Speaker 2: like literally two inches. I have a very short waist,
Speaker 2: and so a lot of the like breath expansion stuff
Speaker 2: or even contraction is like I feel like, even if
Speaker 2: I and I'm not saying I was doing it perfectly,
Speaker 2: far far far from it, but even if I were
Speaker 2: to work on it a lot, I still don't think
Speaker 2: it would ever look super impressive. It's just not gonna
Speaker 2: look super impressive as it does on Like you know,
Speaker 2: I'm gonna use Haley and Anye as two examples from Troop,
Speaker 2: like to watch them do a contemporary and with their
Speaker 2: beautiful long torsos and their beautiful long bodies, it's like
Speaker 2: I look at that and I'm like, oh my god, gorgeous.
Speaker 2: Or Jenna doing a contemporary, I'm like, oh, look at that.
Speaker 1: It's stunning.
Speaker 2: And then it's like, even if I really did my best,
Speaker 2: best best, it's never gonna look like that. It's never
Speaker 2: going to look that beautiful. I just don't have that shape.
Speaker 2: So it was a tough week for me. It was
Speaker 2: just a really tough week, and I was like really
Speaker 2: hard on myself. I had a lot of negative self.
Speaker 1: Talk, and I in order to then comfort.
Speaker 2: Myself from all that negative self talk, I found myself
Speaker 2: just like massively overeating, which then made me feel really
Speaker 2: bad both physically and just mentally and emotionally, like I
Speaker 2: was just really I was coming home and massively overeating
Speaker 2: and then feeling sick, and I was like where is
Speaker 2: this coming from? Like all of this is just really disordered,
Speaker 2: disordered thinking, disordered eating, Like.
Speaker 1: What is going on?
Speaker 2: And I really did realize just how much I was resisting,
Speaker 2: like this stance was bringing up a lot of stuff
Speaker 2: for me and bringing up a lot of old bad habits,
Speaker 2: and uh, yeah, it was a rough week. And I
Speaker 2: talked to Whitney about it. I obviously talked to Up
Speaker 2: about it, and I also talked to Mark. I talked
Speaker 2: to Mark Ballas about it, and he is another one
Speaker 2: who's just so supportive. And so today when we were
Speaker 2: about ready to do our group dance, and I literally
Speaker 2: had like a meltdown right before it started. I like
Speaker 2: all of this, like everything kind of left my brain.
Speaker 2: And we started trying to do like a mini rehearsal,
Speaker 2: and we were supposed to do these four claps and
Speaker 2: I only did three and then I turned my hands
Speaker 2: and then I was like eh, and I was like wait, wait,
Speaker 2: we need to start again. And then we started rehearsal
Speaker 2: again and then I did something else that was so weird,
Speaker 2: and I literally just like looked out locked eyes with Mark,
Speaker 2: and I was like, I'm having a meltdown, and like
Speaker 2: everyone went to go say to me, like you've got this,
Speaker 2: and Mark literally like grabbed me by the shoulders looked
Speaker 2: at me and he was like, stop, don't pay attention
Speaker 2: to anybody else, just look at me right now. And
Speaker 2: he was like, Dangelle, take a deep breath. Tune out
Speaker 2: all the noise, forget that there are all these people here.
Speaker 2: Just lock in like you've got this, you know what
Speaker 2: you're doing.
Speaker 1: Take a deep breath.
Speaker 2: And I was like okay, and he gave me a
Speaker 2: hug and I said, okay, I've got it, and I
Speaker 2: walked back out and we did.
Speaker 1: One more rehearsal.
Speaker 2: Rehearsal went fine, and then we did it and it
Speaker 2: all went off without a hitch and it was incredible
Speaker 2: and it was amazing, and our team dance got the
Speaker 2: first perfect score of the season, a perfect forty, and the.
Speaker 1: Confetti candons went off and it felt great.
Speaker 2: I was so proud of my team and I was
Speaker 2: so proud of everything we had done all week, and
Speaker 2: that is for sure a massive core memory, not just
Speaker 2: from dancing with the stars. For the rest of my life,
Speaker 2: I will remember what it felt like to be a
Speaker 2: part of that team all week, and then what it
Speaker 2: felt like to go out there as a team and
Speaker 2: really kill it and then be recognized for it with
Speaker 2: a perfect score. I'll remember it forever. So anyway, Rock
Speaker 2: and Roll Hall of Fame night, What an incredible night.
Speaker 1: I was so happy with everybody's songs.
Speaker 2: I was standing up in the skybox just listening to
Speaker 2: the songs, watching the performances.
Speaker 1: And I was like, man, there's a banger of a night.
Speaker 2: Like first of all, Alex and Val living on a prayer.
Speaker 1: That dance that Posso was.
Speaker 2: Outstanding, just outstanding, brought the house down so great. I
Speaker 2: couldn't have loved it anymore. I love their dances. I
Speaker 2: love Alex, I love Val. I thought that was just
Speaker 2: an absolutely killer dance. And overheard in the ballroom was Flavor,
Speaker 2: Flav saying that him selecting a nine on the board
Speaker 2: in front of him was a mistake, that he had
Speaker 2: wanted to give them a ten, which which means that
Speaker 2: was supposed to have been the first perfect score of
Speaker 2: the season and that Alex and Vowem would have had
Speaker 2: a forty had he not hit a nine instead. But
Speaker 2: he went to go hold up his ten paddle and
Speaker 2: was then told in his ear, you had selected a nine.
Speaker 2: And I have not seen it yet because I haven't
Speaker 2: had a chance to watch the show. But apparently he
Speaker 2: kind of made a face when he had to hold
Speaker 2: up the nine, and it was because he had intended
Speaker 2: to select a ten and accidentally selected a nine. So
Speaker 2: that is interesting. I thought Flavor Flav brought a lot
Speaker 2: of really fun energy, if you.
Speaker 1: Know what I'm saying. You know what I'm saying. Do
Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying. I thought it was really
Speaker 1: good energy.
Speaker 2: I am gonna say I the scoring on this show
Speaker 2: does confuse me. It is a little confusing. I do
Speaker 2: think that maybe they could benefit from halfs, you know,
Speaker 2: like an eight point five and an eight and then
Speaker 2: nine or a nine point five. But like, even when
Speaker 2: I think about the team dance scores and I think
Speaker 2: about like, you know, I think mainly my main question
Speaker 2: would be, I guess for Derek when he gives a
Speaker 2: critique to Team Cool about the dance, But then is
Speaker 2: you know, says I think the I think the first
Speaker 2: dance was better, but then gives us both the same score.
Speaker 2: I'm like, hmm, okay, so some of that stuff is
Speaker 2: a little confusing to me. I don't think that's out
Speaker 2: of line to say it, just sometimes, you know, people
Speaker 2: are entitled to do whatever they want and pick the
Speaker 2: scores that they want, but it is a little confusing
Speaker 2: as both a person on the ballroom floor and also
Speaker 2: I think as a viewer, sometimes those things are a
Speaker 2: little confusing. Going back to our team dance, I was
Speaker 2: team captain, which I took very seriously, and I honestly,
Speaker 2: if someone from the winning team was going to go home,
Speaker 2: I'm so happy it was me, one hundred percent. If
Speaker 2: I had been the team captain and anyone else went home,
Speaker 2: I would have been furious with myself. So all week
Speaker 2: they kept stressing to us, you know, well, typically someone
Speaker 2: from the losing team goes home. Someone from the losing
Speaker 2: team goes home. And I was like, okay, well, then
Speaker 2: I really don't want us to lose because I don't
Speaker 2: want our team to have somebody have to go home.
Speaker 2: And then of course the winning team had somebody go home,
Speaker 2: and I'm just so happy that it was me, because
Speaker 2: if it had been anybody else, I really would have
Speaker 2: beaten myself up about that, And now I don't have
Speaker 2: to beat myself up about that.
Speaker 1: At least it was me.
Speaker 2: And even as a director, my overall feeling is always
Speaker 2: that everything that happens on a set is my responsibility.
Speaker 2: If something bad happens, even if I had nothing to
Speaker 2: do with it, it's still my responsibility, and I say, I'm
Speaker 2: the first person as the director to say.
Speaker 1: That's on me.
Speaker 2: And then when anything goes right, I always look for
Speaker 2: someone to give the credit to anytime something goes right,
Speaker 2: anytime something goes well, I'm always going to say that
Speaker 2: couldn't have happened without the props department, That couldn't have
Speaker 2: happened without the wardrobe department, That couldn't have happened without
Speaker 2: so and so actor, that couldn't have happened without blink.
Speaker 2: And I just feel like that's a really great way
Speaker 2: of making your team know that they are valued and
Speaker 2: also that they're protected that if something goes wrong, I'm
Speaker 2: not gonna throw them under the bus. It's my responsibility.
Speaker 2: I'm in charge. And that's exactly the attitude I brought
Speaker 2: to this team Dance was like, Okay, I have to
Speaker 2: set the tone, even though the pros are the ones
Speaker 2: doing all the choreography and or definitely taking the lead
Speaker 2: and definitely teaching us and doing all the time management.
Speaker 2: As far as like setting the tone, that was what
Speaker 2: I wanted to do. I just wanted to set a
Speaker 2: really positive, lovely tone where everyone felt valued and respected
Speaker 2: and safe, safe to speak up, safe to say what
Speaker 2: they wanted and valued, that their energy and their their
Speaker 2: genius that they bring to this is of worth. And
Speaker 2: so I hope that I did that. Putting together this
Speaker 2: team was not.
Speaker 1: By chance.
Speaker 2: Funny story that I told also on the show, and
Speaker 2: I guess they chose not to use in our package.
Speaker 2: But since day one in New York at GMA, Dylan
Speaker 2: and I formed an alliance. It feels and sounds kind
Speaker 2: of like a joke because we shot it as a
Speaker 2: TikTok where I said, you know, do you want to
Speaker 2: form an alliance with me? It was from the office,
Speaker 2: and he said, yes.
Speaker 1: Yes I do. But we took it very seriously. We
Speaker 1: really can.
Speaker 2: We really told ourselves we're in an alliance, and our
Speaker 2: plan was together the two of us let's make it
Speaker 2: to the finals. And we have become really very much
Speaker 2: best friends on this little ballroom competition show and on
Speaker 2: the cup.
Speaker 1: On the Monday before.
Speaker 2: We had to do the team picks, Dylan and I
Speaker 2: were talking and we were like, who.
Speaker 1: Becomes the team captains?
Speaker 2: Because there's not a whole lot of them, Like, we
Speaker 2: don't get a lot of early information. We will know like, oh,
Speaker 2: team ances coming up, but they don't ever, they don't
Speaker 2: really like sit us down a full week before and go, FYI,
Speaker 2: here's how it works, and we'll determine who's the lowest,
Speaker 2: you know, the lowest voted or the lowest rated couples,
Speaker 2: and then those people will become team captains. We just
Speaker 2: kind of have to like figure it out a little
Speaker 2: bit on our own. And so we were like, wait,
Speaker 2: who becomes team captains? How does this work for this
Speaker 2: team dance? And we realized it was the two lowest
Speaker 2: scored contestants. So Dylan and I went through and added
Speaker 2: up all the points throughout the entire season and we
Speaker 2: figured out that Andy was the lowest, and then the
Speaker 2: next lowest was Jen, and then the third lowest was me,
Speaker 2: and then Dylan, I think was a couple above me.
Speaker 2: Maybe he was fourth, I don't remember, and I was like, wow, okay,
Speaker 2: Jen and I were only separated by two points, And
Speaker 2: so there were two ways I could end up being
Speaker 2: the second lowest after Andy one that week last week.
Speaker 2: If Jen did better than me in the scores for
Speaker 2: only separated by two points, if she gets four nines
Speaker 2: and I get two eights and two nines, we're now
Speaker 2: at the very least tide.
Speaker 1: Or if she just overall scores.
Speaker 2: Better than me, more than two points better than me,
Speaker 2: I now become the second lowest voted. The other way
Speaker 2: I could end up being the second lowest is if
Speaker 2: Jen went home. So the fact that there were two
Speaker 2: ways that it could end up being that I was
Speaker 2: no longer third on the list, that I was going
Speaker 2: to be number two on the list meant that I
Speaker 2: wanted to start thinking about who would I pick if
Speaker 2: I end up being a team captain.
Speaker 1: I want to be prepared.
Speaker 2: I don't want to on the night, you know, all
Speaker 2: of a sudden we find out I'm a team captain
Speaker 2: and have not thought of this at all. So Dylan
Speaker 2: and I started talking, what are we going to do?
Speaker 2: What do we think the perfect strategy is, And of
Speaker 2: course I wanted to be on a team with Dylan,
Speaker 2: one because I love him, and two because he is
Speaker 2: partnered with Danny, who I think is one of the
Speaker 2: best choreographers. And I also just I just wanted to
Speaker 2: be with them. So I texted Dylan and I was like,
Speaker 2: what is our strategy here? And Dylan put together an
Speaker 2: Excel spreadsheet. This is one of the benefits of being
Speaker 2: in an alliance with someone who can win traders. He
Speaker 2: put together an Excel spreadsheet with all the different possibilities
Speaker 2: of well, let's see, depending on who goes home this,
Speaker 2: you know, you might want to pick this person or
Speaker 2: this person or that person or whatever. And by the
Speaker 2: time we went through the spreadsheet, I had written to
Speaker 2: him in one text dream team Whitney, you me Jordan,
Speaker 2: and he was like, that's the team. And then the
Speaker 2: next morning, which was Tuesday morning, the day of the
Speaker 2: live show, last week's live show, he said, I was
Speaker 2: up thinking about this all night and I said I
Speaker 2: was too, and he said, if you pick Whitney first,
Speaker 2: I really think you should make your second pick Jordan,
Speaker 2: because there is no way Jordan is going to go
Speaker 2: till the very end, and I think you gamble with
Speaker 2: me as your third pick. He said, I don't care
Speaker 2: about it looking like I'm last to be picked on
Speaker 2: the schoolyard. He's like, just let's take a gamble. Of course,
Speaker 2: there's a possibility that Andy ends up picking me and
Speaker 2: I don't end up on your team, but I think
Speaker 2: it's worth the gamble, and I think you need Jordan
Speaker 2: and Whitney. And I was like, okay, I think you're right.
Speaker 2: I think that's probably the smart move. And then we
Speaker 2: get up there into the skybox and we're picking and
Speaker 2: Andy gets to pick first, and I had suspected that
Speaker 2: if Andy was going to pick first, he was going
Speaker 2: to pick Robert first, and sure enough, Andy goes Robert,
Speaker 2: I'm bringing Robert, and I go, okay, it's now my turn.
Speaker 2: I go I'm taking Whitney, and Whitney comes to my side.
Speaker 2: And then Andy gets to go with the second pick,
Speaker 2: and Andy picked Alex and he takes Alex and I go, okay,
Speaker 2: here's my second pick. I'm going to take Jordan, and
Speaker 2: I get Jordan on my team, and now it's down
Speaker 2: to Elane and Dylan as the last two. But Elaine
Speaker 2: wasn't there because she had been injured, and so it
Speaker 2: was Alan standing there. So it was Alan and Dylan
Speaker 2: standing in front of us, and Andy goes, Dylan, and
Speaker 2: my heart sinks. I'm like, my gamble, my gamble of
Speaker 2: taking Dylan third is not going to pay off. And
Speaker 2: then immediately after Andy says, I love you, but I've
Speaker 2: got to go with the lane, and Alan goes walking
Speaker 2: over to Andy and Dylan and I locked eyes and
Speaker 2: Dylan goes, oh.
Speaker 1: My god, it worked.
Speaker 2: He mouthed it to me from across the skybox, and
Speaker 2: I'm like, and Dylan comes walking over and yeah, I
Speaker 2: just I don't know.
Speaker 1: It was so special.
Speaker 2: And then the way the week went and the team
Speaker 2: dance went, I really felt like, yeah, that was good.
Speaker 2: That was good strategy. It really worked for us. It
Speaker 2: was such a special week. And the fact that even I,
Speaker 2: you know, the fact that I got eliminated tonight is
Speaker 2: just not even it really can't bring down the immense
Speaker 2: joy and pride and fun I had in these last
Speaker 2: you know, eleven weeks of my life. It's been almost
Speaker 2: three months, and I wouldn't trade them for anything. Look
Speaker 2: at my little beautiful picture here. I think this was
Speaker 2: a gift just from things remembered, but I'm not sure
Speaker 2: it could have actually been from someone but without a card.
Speaker 2: But it's got a picture of Pasha and me in
Speaker 2: it and at the bottom it says Dancing with the
Speaker 2: Stars Season thirty four, and I love it. I have
Speaker 2: so many great memories from this experience that I'll have
Speaker 2: with me for the rest of my life, and including
Speaker 2: doing this podcast for you guys. Thank you for humoring
Speaker 2: me and letting me just have this experience. It's been
Speaker 2: so fun. I'm not stopping. There are still three weeks
Speaker 2: left in the competition, and I'm going to keep this
Speaker 2: podcast going until the season ends. I'm still going to
Speaker 2: bring you some great guests. I want to interview Kimmy,
Speaker 2: my hairdresser. I want to interview Dan Yella, the costumer.
Speaker 2: I want to interview Alfonso. I'd love to interview Julianne.
Speaker 2: I have so many people I want to interview and
Speaker 2: bring to you guys. So I'm still I'm still going
Speaker 2: to do all that. I'm still going to make sure
Speaker 2: that goes on. Even though I am no longer in
Speaker 2: the competition, I still am a part of the Dancing
Speaker 2: with the Stars family now and especially this twentieth year
Speaker 2: and this thirty fourth season. I don't know if I'm
Speaker 2: going to be in the ballroom next week for the
Speaker 2: twentieth anniversary. There's a big party and I might go
Speaker 2: for that, and then I will be in the finale.
Speaker 2: Everybody comes back for the finale. I'll probably get to
Speaker 2: do a little two eight counts or something with Pasha,
Speaker 2: which will be really fun.
Speaker 1: And yeah, that's it.
Speaker 2: I've loved every moment of this journey and I thank
Speaker 2: you for all of your votes. I thank you for
Speaker 2: all of your comments. I thank you for all of
Speaker 2: your support. It's really been the experience of a lifetime.
Speaker 2: And also there's just so many people I have to
Speaker 2: think that I will start crying. But thank you to
Speaker 2: my husband, Jensen Karp, producer, husband of this podcast, who
Speaker 2: I really wouldn't have been able to do this experience without.
Speaker 2: He's just been He's been there every week, he's been
Speaker 2: there every single day for our kids. He's made sure
Speaker 2: they were taken care of. He's made sure the house
Speaker 2: has functioned, he's made sure everything has gone off without
Speaker 2: a hitch, so that I've really been able to just
Speaker 2: give myself this gift for these last three months of
Speaker 2: just really focusing on me and it was really really,
Speaker 2: really really nice. It was quite a gift, So I
Speaker 2: owe him a big gift. And also, of course thank
Speaker 2: you to Pasha, who made this entire experience beautiful from
Speaker 2: the first day we met, and I'm so glad that
Speaker 2: we're neighbors and we're in each other's lives forever. And
Speaker 2: thank you to Dina and to Conrad from the BBC
Speaker 2: and from Dancing with the Stars. I love you the
Speaker 2: entire crew. If I were to name everybody, it take
Speaker 2: me forever. But some people I really specifically really love
Speaker 2: the hair and makeup and wardrobe team, all of security.
Speaker 2: I love the security guys, They're so great. Dave, Mike everyone,
Speaker 2: I love you all, all the camera guys, all the producers,
Speaker 2: everybody at Highland honestly, which reminds me. I have a
Speaker 2: bunch of shirts I have to give out. I made
Speaker 2: to Pasha air shirts with the logo of Pasha holding
Speaker 2: me in that Argentine tango last final pose, and I
Speaker 2: have them in my car and there. It was a
Speaker 2: gift for everybody at Highland and now I have to
Speaker 2: Now I have to give those out anyway, Thank you
Speaker 2: all for listening to this episode of Danielle with I
Speaker 2: will see you all next week. I might wear my
Speaker 2: Dancing with the Stars robe, I won't be in hair
Speaker 2: and makeup. You're gonna you're gonna see like back to normal,
Speaker 2: normal Danielle. Not this like such a glamorous version of
Speaker 2: Danielle that that I.
Speaker 1: Get to experience.
Speaker 2: That's now gone until the finale. Anyway, Thank you all,
Speaker 2: Talk to you next time.
Speaker 1: Bye.
Speaker 2: Danielle with the Stars produced and hosted by Danielle Fischell.
Speaker 2: Executive producers Jensen Carp and Amy Sugarman, Executive in charge
Speaker 2: of production Danielle Romo, Producer, editor and engineer Tara Sudbosch.
Speaker 2: Theme song by Justin Siegel. Follow us on Instagram at
Speaker 2: Danielle with Stars and vote for me