Dancing with the Stars eliminated singer Michael Bolton and his professional partner Chelsie Hightower during Tuesday night's second live eleventh-season results show on ABC.
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Bolton and Hightower were ousted from the competition based on the combination of the Dancing with the Stars judges' scores they received during Monday night's performance show and the home viewer votes that were cast afterwards.
"Yeah," Bolton replied when Dancing with the Stars co-host Brooke Burke asked if the ouster surprised him. "I'm disappointed. Chelsie's been awesome and I wanted her to go on and on as well. It's a disappointing vote."
"Michael is such a genuine person," Hightower added. "It was honestly such an honor to work with you and such an honor to be with you this past month. And I really am so proud of you, I really am."
Bolton and Hightower had finished last on Monday night's judging leaderboard after they performed a jive which received only 12 out of 30 possible points from Dancing with the Stars judges Len Goodman, Carrie Ann Inaba and Bruno Tonioli.
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Prior to his elimination, Bolton had also voiced his frustration about Tonioli's Monday night comments in which the judge had called the performance "probably the worst jive in 11 seasons."
"I think Bruno was inappropriate and disrespectful. Other than that, it was a phenomenal, phenomenal experience up to now and I'm ready for the next one," he vented.
Tonioli -- who had awarded Bolton and Hightower only 3 out of 10 points for their jive, compared to Goodman and Inaba's respective 5 and 4 scores -- had stood by his Monday night comments earlier in Tuesday night's broadcast.
"I think Rin Tin Tin would have done a better jive," Tonioli told Dancing with the Stars host Tom Bergeron about the performance, which had featured the couple dancing to Elvis Presley's "Hound Dog" and Bolton emerging from a doghouse on all fours.
"[Bolton's] a fantastic singer, he's a wonderful person -- it's nothing personal. But I'm here to call it as I see it, that's my job."
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Jersey Shore star Mike "The Situation" Sorrentino and partner Karina Smirnoff were the other couple still in danger of elimination prior to Bolton and Hightower's ouster, however Bergeron did not specify whether they were the other couple in the bottom two based on the combination of the judges' scoring and home viewer votes from Monday night's performances.
In addition to Bolton and Hightower's exit, the Dancing with the Stars results show broadcast also attempted to refute media reports that the show's studio audience had been booing controversial former politician Sarah Palin when viewers heard off-camera boos while Burke was interviewing actress Jennifer Grey and partner Derek Hough after their performance on Monday night's live performance show.
Grey and Hough's jive routine had received 24 out of 30 points from the judges -- the highest score of the night.
"There was quite a buzz in the press and there was a little a bit of controversy in the ballroom last night, when you got your scores from the judges, everyone was booing," Burke told Grey and Hough before the show broadcast alternate judging table footage which showed the boos beginning after the scores were revealed and the judges believing the boos were directed at them.
"It seems to me, based on that footage, that the audience was booing because they thought you deserved higher scores, how do you guys feel?" Burke asked Grey and Hough afterward.
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"Yeah... that's very flattering. That's an awesome response, to get booed for getting a lower score than they wanted, but we were very happy with it," Hough replied.
"I'm thrilled with 8's," Grey added.
"Just to put the final nail in the coffin of 'boo-gate,' Sarah Palin told told me before the show that she thought that she was surprised by all the controversy because she was booing you guys too," Bergeron quipped to the judges. "So there."
About The Author: Steven Rogers