Tyra Banks’s run hosting this season of Dancing With the Stars has so far been a lesson in how not to host a live reality competition show — from mixing up contestants’ names to a general inability to banter. Banks herself has even acknowledged it, admitting her hosting “wasn’t perfect†two episodes in. As fate would have it, last night’s episode was a host’s worst nightmare: Banks accidentally named Cheer coach Monica Aldama and her partner Val Chmerkovskiy safe, when they were supposed to be in the bottom two. Banks didn’t notice her error until she was ready to present the bottom two to the judges and noticed she had three couples: actor Anne Heche and her partner Keo Motsepe, Selling Sunset’s Chrishell Stause and her partner Gleb Savchenko, and former NFL tight end Vernon Davis and his partner Peta Murgatroyd. Steve Harvey who? Stause and Davis were both named safe as Banks scrambled to get Aldama back onstage. “This is live TV, right? This is the craziness of live TV!†Banks said before returning to her down-to-business demeanor and pressing the judges for their saves. They saved Monica and Val — and wouldn’t that have been a cruel way to go, anyway? Banks apologized throughout the rest of the broadcast. “This live TV, and we’re all human,†she said.
At least one good thing happened on Dancing With the Stars’ October 5 episode though: Actor Skai Jackson dedicated her dance to Cameron Boyce, her former co-star on Disney Channel’s Jessie who died at 20 last year. “He was kind of like a big-brother figure to me,†she told her partner, Alan Bersten, ahead of the performance. “He always looked out for me through everything. He really molded me into the person that I am now.†Jackson danced the foxtrot to John Legend’s “Ordinary People†and earned the night’s highest marks — including the first 10 of the competition, from Carrie Ann Inaba. “I’m sure that Cameron is watching you right now and he is so proud of you,†Inaba said. “It was just sheer perfection.â€