There’s something I haven’t been wanting to admit, even to myself. But as we two-step closer and closer to the end — and there’s only one more week to go, people — it’s time for me to confess that I’m actually gunning for Joey on “Dancing with the Stars.”
Rest assured, I took my sweet time warming up to him. This delay might have been because of his shaved head, a shocking sight for anyone who’d grown accustomed to the notion of the words “Joey” and “Lawrence” together signifying a teen idol. It could have to do with the fact that he’d had one of those call-me-Joseph-no-call-me-Joey identity crises that former child stars always seem to go through when they mature into self-important nightmares. It was surely related to my being so mesmerized by Mario’s moves that I’ve been all but blind to everything but his dimples and “Gee, gosh” modesty.
But now, Mario, I’m afraid you have to move over because Mr. Lawrence has samba’d his way into first place in my heart. Somewhere between seeing him dedicate that dance to his “Pop pop” and watching his veins nearly bulge out of the top and side of his naked skull as he basically yelped with unbridled enthusiasm over his perfect score, I found myself firmly placed in Joey’s corner, thoughts of that album he released in the early nineties a distant and nearly irrelevant thought.
Over on “The Amazing Race,” meanwhile, I’m having a harder time picking favorites, although I’ve narrowed it down to the beauty queens and formerly-drug-addicted models. Actually, I’d like them both to win, and then for one of each team to mate with one of the other, so that the world could be treated to the most beautiful DNA mixture this side of Brangelina.
In all seriousness, the beauty queens have not only dispelled every dumb blonde stereotype I had when I first laid eyes on them, but they’re also so damn nice to each other that I’m willing to bet that the ill will they inspire (I’m talking to you, 'Bama girls) is based solely on jealousy. The model/former drug addicts, on the other hand, I simply like because I’m a red-blooded woman and they make a trip to Madagascar look damn good. They’re so attractive, in fact, that I didn’t even fast-forward through this week’s Fast Forward, which had them ingesting an endless pile of cow lips — still containing hair and teeth — alongside Rob and a puking-her-way-through-it Kimberly in an outdoor market. I know there are a lot of male models out there, but seriously, how many of them can make cow lip eating look good?
I swear, I wasn’t even planning to use that as a segue into asking what the hell Jennifer is still doing on “The Bachelor” — I mean, I figured I’d lay off she and Lisa-of-the-five-year-marriage-and-baby plan since the show wasn’t even on this week. But since Jen does sort of have a pair of cow lips and hanging out with Lisa has got to be about as fun as chilling with the puking Kimberly at the outdoor market, I might as well say that if Prince Lorenzo Borghese doesn’t pick Sadie to be his lawful wedded wife, I’ll never buy another Borghese beauty product again.
Not that I mean to pick favorites.
Anna David has been on staff at Premiere and Parenting magazines and wrote a sex and relationship column for Razor. She’s done celebrity cover stories, first-person essays and reported pieces for The L.A. Times, Vanity Fair, Cosmo, People, Us Weekly, Redbook, Self, Details, Stuff, TV Guide, Women’s Health, Ocean Drive, Vegas, The Saturday Telegraph, Esquire UK, Teen Vogue, Variety, The New York Post, LA Confidential, Distinction, Calabasas, Tatler (Hong Kong), King, Fade In, Emmy and Maxim, among others.
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