Saturday, June 12, 2010

2009-2010 Ice Dance: Part Two

2009-2010 Season In Review: Part 14 of 16
Ice Dance: Part 2 of 4

Anna Cappellini/Luca Lanotte. Current World Ranking: #12
[top: Skate America, middle: European Championships, bottom: World Championships]
Compulsory Dance
We love the Euros costumes. We love the black and gold. We love Lanotte's vest and pocket square. Their costume for the rest of the season? Well, we're conflicted on that. Bee loves it. She loves how swingy the skirt is and how glittery the top is. Elle understands why she likes it, but it's a little too frothy for her taste, and she doesn't love the colors.
[top: Skate America, bottom: World Championships]
Original Dance: Italian Folk Dance: Torna a Surriento / Italian Tarantella: La Danza by G. Rossini
Elle thinks that changing the costumes was a good choice. Bee thinks they're both equally fine. The Skate America version is just a bit too Christmas-y for our tastes. Cappellini looks cute in the Worlds version, but Lanotte needs some color in his costume. All white is not a good look on the ice. When will skaters realize this?

Free Dance: Addiction (Requiem for a Dream soundtrack by Clint Mansell) 
This is a tragedy. Lanotte is wearing baggy flare jeans and sporting visible chest hair, and Cappellini is wearing scrunched legwarmers with a turtleneck dress. At least she looks good in black. That is the redeeming thing about this costume for her.


Emily Samuelson/Evan Bates. Current World Ranking: #13
[top two: Olympics, bottom two: Worlds]
Compulsory Dance 
We have completely opposite opinions on these costumes, because apparently that's our thing? Bee likes Bates' Worlds costume, tails or not, but Elle likes the pinstriped version much better. On the other hand, Bee prefers Samuelson's red and purple dress over the white one, while Elle prefers the white.

[top: Trophee Eric Bompard, bottom two: World Championships]
Original Dance: American Folk: Dixie Chicks Medley
Bee was very excited to write about Emily and Evan because she adored this Original Dance. And seriously? These costumes are cute. They are silly and fun and aren't trying to be anything but that. Bates is wearing chaps. While he goddamned ice skates. We're so glad that Samuelson changed her costume because her dress is so wonderful and cut nicely for her. It's impossible to hate these costumes or this dance.

 [top two: U.S. Championships, bottom two: Olympics]
Free Dance: Canto Della Terra performed by Sarah Brightman and Andrea Bocelli
The purple costumes are classy and simple and Elle's preferred version of this costume. Bee likes the red and gold ones better because they look amazing with Samuelson's coloring. She loves the gold lace bodice.


Maia Shibutani/Alex Shibutani. Current World Ranking: #11
[top: Junior U.S. Championships, bottom: Junior World Championships]
Compulsory Dance 
We love the version of this costume from Nationals. Maia's gold dress is stunning and Alex's cummerbund is equally great.

Original Dance: Japanese Folk Music: Itsuka Mata by Tetsuro Naito / Ao-ki kaze by Ryutaro Kaneko 
LOOOOOOVE. No seriously, we are absolutely in love with these costumes, although it doesn't hurt that we also love the Shibutanis. Maia Shibutani, can we be best friends? In case you went blind due to the sheer awesomeness of this costume, she is wearing purple capri leggings. This is definitely one of our favorite Original Dance costumes of the season.

[top two: Junior Grand Prix Final, bottom: Junior World Championships]
Free Dance: Tango Rhapsody by Luis Enriques Bacalov
The version of these costumes in which Alex wore a red cummerbund are wonderful. We love cummerbunds. With that said, Bee is also a fan of Maia's other dress. She's not really sure when she started liking fringe so much, but she suspects it was around the time she saw Meryl wearing THIS.


Vanessa Crone/Paul Poirier. Current World Ranking: #10
[top: Olympics, bottom two: World Championships]
Compulsory Dance
We have mixed feelings on the Olympics costumes (the dress is nice, but why are Poirier's pants so high-waisted?). But that's not the real issue. How embarrassing must it have been when Crone and Cappellini showed up to Worlds in the same dress? Should have registered at the store before the prom, ladies.

[top: NHK, middle: Grand Prix Final, bottom: World Championships]
Original Dance: Spanish Flamenco: En Malaga performed by Roger Scannura 
These costumes got better every time they were changed. We like the switch to white on black for the GPF, but we really like the Worlds costumes. Yeah, they're a little boring, but we're in agreement that simple and classy is a big step above eye-searingly ugly, which is always an option in skating costumes.

[top: Grand Prix Final, bottom: Olympics]
Free Dance: Nocturne by Paul Swartz, performed by Lucia Micarelli / Bohemian Rhapsody by Freddie Mercury 
Elle was alarmed by the fact that there seemed to be some sort of accident with these GPF costumes, tearing Crone's completely in half. Bee was too distracted by Crone's skirt. She admitted that she if she saw it when she was fourteen, she would have insisted on buying it, and Elle agreed. Elle could see her past self buying it off some website that advertised alternative clothing, hand sewn by some middle-aged goth woman in her attic. Bee suggested that she might have bought it in New York in the East Village, and pretended to know all about authentic punk. Suffice it to say that we were insufferable at age fourteen and no one should try to imitate us. That said, the Olympics costumes are also really ugly. The fitted part of Crone's dress looks like a poorly-fitted bathing suit top.


Madison Chock/Greg Zuerlein. Current World Ranking: #15
Compulsory Dance 
We love Chock's dress, particularly the color. We still don't like tails on the ice, but it makes sense for compulsory dance.

[top: Skate America, bottom: Four Continents]
Original Dance: Afro Cuban Dance: Yema Ya / Agua Nile 
We don't like either version of these costumes, but the Four Continents ones are worse. The cropped top thing is dated and unattractive, but the Four Continents dress looks like brightly-colored seaweed. We know they're doing Afro Cuban Dance, but we were going to guess that their cultural theme was mermaids.

Free Dance: La Vie est Belle performed by Andre Rieu 
This was where Elle reached her breaking point. "God, I'm so bored," she complained. "Are these costumes? Yeah, they're ugly. Whatever. Give me purple catsuits!" Bee hates this Renn Faire look that a lot of lady skaters go for. She claimed to like Zuerlein's jacket at first, but when Elle questioned her she admitted it was only because it reminded her of Ryan Bradley's free skate costume this season. And while we both loved Ryan Bradley's FS, it's not a good look.

[Photo Credits: Cappellini/Lanotte CD1&3, OD1, FD; Samuelson/Bates CD1&2, OD2&3, FD2,3,&4; Crone/Poirier CD2&3, OD1,2,3,&4, FD3&4; Chock/Zuerlein CD, OD1, FD1: Getty
Cappellini/Lanotte CD2, OD2; Samuelson/Bates CD3&4, FD1; Crone/Poirier CD1, FD1&2; Chock/Zuerlein FD2: Reuters
Samuelson/Bates OD1, Chock/Zuerlein OD2: AP
Shibutani/Shibutani CD2: Dee Eggert
Shibutani/Shibutani CD1, FD1: Daphne Backman
Shibutani/Shibutani OD, FD4: Robin Ritoss
Shibutani/Shibutani FD2&3: Liz Chastney]

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