Whitney Leavitt and Mark Ballas appeared on the “Call Her Daddy” podcast Wednesday and addressed their controversial “Dancing with the Stars” elimination.
Despite receiving high scores from the judges throughout the season, Leavitt and Ballas were shockingly eliminated in the semifinals of DWTS Season 34. However, the 32-year-old “Secrets of a Mormon Wife” star didn’t score well in a fan vote and faced intense backlash for her dancing background.
Levitt laughed off the criticism when asked about it by Call Your Daddy host Alex Cooper. Although she has a degree in modern dance from Brigham Young University, she said the style of dancing on “DWTS” was clearly foreign to her.
“It’s very new for me to dance with my partner in this position and it’s completely different,” she claimed. “Of course, that background helped me learn different techniques, but this was still very new to me.”
She also said that she stopped dancing after having three children.
“I would love to go take a class once in a while, but no, I wasn’t actively dancing,” she said.
Ballas pointed out that there hasn’t been a season of “DWTS” without contestants with dance experience, like past winners Nicole Scherzinger and Jordan Fisher. He said fans noticed Leavitt more because of her natural performance ability.
“She’s a dynamic performer, but that’s something I can’t teach,” he said.
The conversation then took a dark turn when Ballas talked about how the hate he received from himself and Levitt this season affected him. Levitt was criticized for admitting in Season 3 of The Secret Life of Mormons that she only agreed to return to reality TV to audition for DWTS.
Ballas said that in all of his past seasons on “DWTS,” he has never seen fans actively band together and vote on all the other couples just to kick them out of the competition. He also became emotional after reading hateful comments directed at him online, which called him “dishonest” and “worthless” and wished he had burned in hell.
Barras said she did not participate because of such hatred, but simply because she wanted to participate in a fun dance competition that brings joy to people.
Levitt said she was used to hate, but seeing Barras experience it for the first time was even more shocking. When Cooper asked her if she had a message for haters, she responded cheerfully.
“I don’t know, because what I’m trying to say is, ‘Fuck you,'” she said, laughing with Ballas.
Since Leavitt was without a doubt one of the best dancers in the competition technically, many fans were disappointed that she and Ballas were unable to perform their freestyle dance in the finals (one of the most anticipated performances of the season due to the anything-goes nature).
Podcast and ABC actually created a set for the two to perform their freestyle dance routine, performing a stunning routine to Frank Sinatra’s “My Way.”
Leavitt appeared in a showgirl costume, then stripped down to a bedazzling long-sleeved leotard. At one point, she applied red lipstick to her face during a dramatic dance.
The performance ended with the message, “Social media is bad for your health.”
Robert Irwin won the Mirrorball Trophy with partner Witney Carson on Tuesday after an epic three-hour finale. Irwin, who has been a frontrunner all season, praised her sister Bindi Irwin, who won the Mirrorball Trophy with partner Derek Hough in 2015.
“It meant everything to me to follow in those footsteps and do the same thing,” the 21-year-old Australian conservationist told People after the show’s finale. “This completely changed my life.”
Robert told the outlet that Bindi’s win 10 years ago was special because it allowed the family to educate the public about conservation, charity work and the Australian Zoo and Wildlife Warriors.
“It’s about making the world a better place, and when I saw her hold up the mirror ball, I knew she was holding up that message,” he said.
