Dancing with the Stars guest judge Julianne Hough is, once again, making waves after harshly critiquing Maksim Chmerkovskiy's jive performance with his temporary "Switch-Up" partner Danica McKellar during Monday night's performance show.
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"The shit that Julianne made up was nothing but exactly that. It was an invalid comment that had nothing to do with Danica's performance, which was brilliant," Maksim told The Hollywood Reporter.
For the "Switch-Up," America voted for Maksim to dance with his brother Val Chmerkovskiy's original partner and vice versa, requiring Val to dance with Meryl Davis just for the week. After Maksim and Danica took the stage, Julianne suggested Maksim put little effort into the choreography -- as if he wanted to just get the week over with.
"I wanted to see you [Danica]. We all know what a great dancer you are. I'm going to say this because I am the brutal Julianne that I am. I almost felt like, Maks, and I'm sorry, you're Mark this year," Julianne told the couple, making an apparent reference to her guest judging controversy with pro Mark Ballas last fall.
"I felt like it was a little bit like you couldn't -- it was like, this week could get past so that you could be back with Meryl and you just had to phone it in so you could get back with Meryl. So, I'm sorry. And I can't wait for [Danica] to get back with Val because I know your partnership is so great. So, I'm sorry Maks, I love you, I do. Sorry!"
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While Julianne's comment clearly pissed off Maksim, it also rubbed Val the wrong way.
"Personally, I thought it was very irresponsible of her to make those comments. You can question a million things, but you can never question my brother's passion and commitment to my well-being -- ask Danica," Val told The Reporter.
"There's nothing he would ever do to jeopardize my success on the show -- and Danica's an extension of me -- my partnership and my success, and so for me, I took it kind of personally."
Maksim also attributed any problems in his dance with Danica to technical issues.
"Our dance was a disaster from a production standpoint," Maksim said, further arguing why he believes Julianne's point was invalid.
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Similarly, NeNe Leakes and Derek Hough admitted to having production issues during Monday night's show. Their music was apparently off cue and threw NeNe off a little bit at the beginning of her jazz routine.
But Maksim and Val aren't the only pro dancers who disagree with Julianne's critique.
"I felt like it was a little bit inappropriate. I felt like [Maksim] was trying his best, and some people have the chemistry from the beginning and some people don't," Cheryl Burke told The Reporter.
Maksim and Val also claimed they helped one another a lot throughout the "Switch-Up" week. However, Val clearly ended up being more successful. Maksim and Danica scored 32 out of 40 possible points for their jive, while Val and Meryl earned a near-perfect 39 points for their tango.
"They gave my best dance to [Maksim] and his best dance to me," Val added. "I was really stressed about that. I was calling my brother all of the time and he said, 'Listen, if it looks like Argentine tango, it probably is.'"
About The Author: Elizabeth Kwiatkowski