Las Vegas Weekly

April 6, 2009 · 7:32 PM

Chuck and ACM winner Julianne kick off DWTS; Chuck nixes marriage

By Robin Leach

Chuck Wicks and Julianne Hough.

Photo: ABC TV

Maybe the producers were frightened that Julianne Hough and Chuck Wicks might pass out or fall asleep from their hectic weekend schedule in Las Vegas. They were up today at 4 a.m. for a 5:30 a.m. flight to L.A. for Dancing With the Stars’ dress rehearsal and the live telecast. So executives of the ABC hit show put the romantic twosome on first to dance their Viennese waltz.

Don’t read any further if you plan on watching the tape-delayed West Coast broadcast of ABC’s Dancing With the Stars and want nothing spoiled beforehand! But come back after the show to compare notes!

Julianne won Top New Artist last night at the Academy of Country Music Awards here at the MGM Grand Garden Arena after she spent the entire weekend rehearsing her dance steps with her singer boyfriend Chuck -- and after both of them performed separate concerts before the rehearsals and ACM Awards!

At their rehearsals here in Tony Delgado’s dance studio in Summerlin, Chuck told me: “We’re beat. We’re tired. We’ll be the ones dancing with red eyes. But we’re determined to do even better.”

Last night backstage at the ACM Awards, Julianne told me: “It’s pretty funny that all the country stars here are watching us on the TV show. All the Nashville writers and recording people are voting for us, so we have to do better than before! But it’s going to be very tough. I’m exhausted. I’m crying because we’ve had no sleep. We had to stop all dancing today and just make this day about the music and our date night!”

Julianne also said backstage last night: “My music is my real passion, and I couldn’t have made that move over from Dancing With the Stars without my fans. I knew it would be a very hard transition. It’s sure been a weird transition. If I could win any award in my lifetime, this would be it because it was entirely fan-voted. Now if only we can get them all voting the same way for Chuck and me on Dancing With the Stars!

“Chuck has been great on the show. He’s really changing each week. He is so great; he listens to everything the judges say, and maybe doesn’t completely agree with them, and trusts me. He takes what they say, and we work really hard. He’s so competitive, and I am, too. But I think he’s at a good point. I think this next week, we’re dancing to ‘Feels Like Today’ by Rascal Flatts, and hopefully that will give us that extra edge. So hopefully this week will be our breakthrough week.”

It was a great dance for them, with the judges praising the fact that Chuck had finally come out of hibernation and stepped out of Julianne’s shadows. They got their best score of the season to date with 23 out of 30. Back in the waiting lounge, though, there was an awkward moment when Chuck was asked if he would be proposing marriage to Julianne soon, and he replied with one uncomfortable word: “No.”

In other scores: Lawrence Taylor and Edyta Sliwinska danced the paso doble to Spanish bullfighting music and scored 20 out of 30. Shawn Johnson and Mark Ballas scored 26 for their Viennese waltz; Lil’ Kim and Derek Hough were awarded 26 points for their Viennese waltz; and Ty Murray and Chelsea Hightower disappointed with just 21 for their paso doble.

Melissa Rycroft and Tony Dovolani danced the paso doble and scored 25, while front-runners Gilles Marini and Cheryl Burke had the high score of the night with 29 for their paso doble. David Alan Grier and Kym Johnson danced the Viennese waltz and scored 22, but Kym should have been given a perfect 30 because of the miracle she pulled off wearing the smallest dress of the year without a wardrobe malfunction!

At the bottom of the judges scoring were Steve-O and Lacey Schwimmer with 18 for their Viennese waltz. Now the question is whether the viewer votes will agree, and they get axed on the results show. We’ll know the answer in just 24 hours.

Check back here to Vegas DeLuxe tomorrow, when we’ll have overnight action photos from the dance floor and the guessing game as to who faces the ax on the Tuesday night results show.

We’ll also have our exclusive story on our Merry Mayor of Mirth Oscar Goodman making the injury list from rehearsals for the “Vegas Dancing With the Stars’ contest coming up in two weeks. Oscar told me: “I never believed one human being could be in so much pain!”

Robin Leach has been a journalist for more than 50 years and has spent the past decade giving readers the inside scoop on Las Vegas, the world’s premier platinum playground.

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