Here's the story of TV theme song week on Dancing With the Stars.
Of course Florence Henderson whirled around the floor to the Brady Bunch theme, but, nostalgia aside, the still sexy septuagenarian wasn't the one who dumbed herself down for no good reason.
Read on to find out who reached the nadir of their TV careers tonight:
Mark Ballas made the Monkees-brained decision to come out jiving with Bristol Palin while wearing gorilla suits to prove to the judges just how whimsical and fun-loving Bristol can be.
Sure, a charming idea in theory, but it totally messed with the 19-year-old's timing. And to date we had been thinking that the judges were being undeservingly hard on her! Tonight, however, she truly was terrible, and worse yet, we didn't think she looked like she was having any more fun than usual out there.
Yet the judges praised more than ever purely on a performance basis because of that darn monkey suit.
Lame.
• Former frenemies Brandy and Maksim Chmerkovskiy repaired their chemistry—and won over the judges—with a quickstep sprightly danced to the Rembrants' "I'll Be There for You" from Friends. (Which really only makes us think of Courteney Cox these days, but that's another story.) We thought the routine seemed rushed due to the sped-up song, but it netted them their highest score of the season—which also happened to land them in first place for the first time.
• Despite a seemingly picture-perfect routine, Jennifer Grey ended up in second place after Carrie Ann Inaba and Len Goodman failed to find any excitement in her foxtrot to the Married...With Children theme, "Love and Marriage." Bruno Tonioli found it "pristine, elegant and beautifully danced," but there were no 10s to be had this week.
• While Florence and Corky Ballas pushed the envelope plenty last week with their purposely gropey rumba, the oddity factor hit a new high tonight when Greg Brady himself, Barry Williams (whose rumored romance with his TV stepmom is a thing of sitcom legend), stopped by rehearsal to, ahem, show Corky a thing or two about getting down with Mrs. Brady. And somehow, you can tango to the Brady theme.
• The Bewitched theme might have been the most enjoyable song of the night to listen to, even if Kurt Warner's quickstep could have used a few more nose wiggles to make it magical.
• Audrina Patridge and Tony Dovolani did a rumba to The Hills' theme, "Unwritten" by Natasha Bedingfield, and ended up with a scene from Mannequin. The reality star has been one of our favorites, but when the story called for steam heat she came up with cold cuts, with a side of plastic smile.
• A mustache and Afro-sporting Kyle Massey ended up taking the heat for the generous amount of disco that Farrah, er, Lacey Schwimmer sprinkled into their fox-trot to the Charlie's Angels theme. The results were schizophrenic across the board, with Bruno not thinking there was enough fox-trot, Carrie Ann digging the disco and Len hating it so much he gave them a 5.
• Though at times he resembled a cop-stripper who was about to "write Cheryl a ticket," Rick Fox got better and better as their Hill Street Blues rumba went along. Definitely not a punishable offense. (And he and athletic adversary Kurt Warner remain neck-and-neck.
Here's how tonight's leaderboard stacked up:
Brandy & Maks Chmerkovskiy: 27
Jennifer Grey & Derek Hough:: 25
Kurt Warner & Anna Trebunskaya: 24
Rick Fox & Cheryl Burke: 24
Audrina Patridge & Tony Dovolani: 23
Florence Henderson & Corky Ballas: 21
Kyle Massey & Lacey Schwimmer: 20
Bristol Palin & Mark Ballas: 18
Another star is let go Tuesday following performances by Shakira and Jason Derulo.
(Originally published Oct. 18, 2010, at 7:10 p.m. PT)