Sarah Ferguson
THE FORBIDDEN DANCE: You know, maybe the John Lithgow character in Footloose was right, and we ought to ban dancing.
According to a USA Today story, the former Duchess of York is a big Dancing With The Stars fan, and took the occasion of some charity work that put her alongside this season’s winner, Emmitt Smith, to express her hope that red-haired ex-royals could find a place on the show.
“I’d quite like to go on Dancing With The Stars,” Sarah Ferguson, ex-wife of Prince Andrew, the Duke of York, told Inside Edition last week. “I’d like them to teach me the tango.”
Ferguson appeared at McDonald’s in Times Square last week with Smith and his dance partner, Cheryl Burke, to help celebrate World Children’s Day.
Ferguson, still known as the Duchess of York despite her divorce from Prince Andrew a decade ago, said that she got interested in the tango after a visit to Buenos Aires.
“I did go to the oldest tango place and I did look at it and think ‘I can try this,’ ” she said. The producers of the show must have had a fit of the vapours when they heard this, and immediately got on the phone as soon as they were sufficiently recovered.
Suffice to say, if they can actually land Ferguson for some upcoming season, the half-life of the publicity afterglow will mean that we may be watching Dancing With The Stars when the Olsen twins get lifetime achievement Oscars and the defrosted head of Walt Disney is hosting a show on Turner Classic Movies.
IF YOU’RE A GEEK, YOU’D BETTER STRAP ON YOUR DEPENDS RIGHT NOW: This season’s hit sci-fi show has pulled off a casting coup that will have them pouring out of comic book shops all over the continent, dancing like the kids on Fame.
George Takei, who will always be known as Sulu on the original Star Trek, is apparently lined up to play the father of Hiro on Heroes. The Japanese supergeek with the superpowers, played by part-time software engineer Masi Oka, will get his own Jor-El in an upcoming episode of the show, according to an E! Online story.
“This is absolutely brilliant,” Oka told TV Guide. “Hiro’s father is this big honcho who shows up in America with his bodyguard. He has this whole elaborate scheme to kidnap his son and take him back to Japan.”
“I just hope I get to say, ‘Dad! Sulu is my hero, not you!’ The sci-fi fans would love it!” Oka said.
Love it? They’ll be able to endure a year’s worth of wedgies and romantic rejections by the Maggie Gyllenhaal look-alike at Kinkos if this goes down. Don’t count on the IT guy at work returning your calls for at least a week.
