Dancing With The Stars Season 35 is officially underway. After the two-night premiere, the scores and votes were tallied, and two contestants went home. Both Connor Leavitt and Sarah Jane Nader were eliminated in Week 1. However, one contestant, Guillermo Rodriguez, was actually hoping that he’d be the one going home.
Guillermo, 55, told Dancing With The Stars Official Podcast host Andy Richter that he wanted off the show before the premiere. “At the beginning, I wanted to go home,” the Jimmy Kimmel Live star revealed.
Guillermo Rodriguez Opens Up About His DWTS Premiere Night Nerves
“You must have said five times, ‘I want to go home. Send me home. Don’t vote for me,’” Richter recalled hearing Guillermo say. In addition, the TV personality admitted that he was worried about partnering with the reigning Mirrorball champion, Witney Carson.
However, he feels differently now that he has one week of competition and made it through the first elimination. “Now, it’s like, I gotta learn. I gotta learn how to dance. I gotta practice. I want to do good in the second week,” he explained. “It sucks to be in the bottom.”
Unfortunately, Guillermo may have a long way to go. He found himself at the bottom of the leaderboard during Week 1 of the competition. With a score of 10 out of 30 for his Cha Cha, it seems that Guillermo has the right attitude of wanting to do better for Week 2.
“I feel good. I feel great, but when they announced who was going home, I was like, ‘Yeah!’ And then I go, ‘Wow, wait, I have five days to prepare for a second one,’” Guillermo dished. “I was like, ‘Oh, my God.’ I’m already stressed.” Meanwhile, Witney has complete faith in her dance partner.
Witney Carson Defends Her Partner’s Scores
“I feel like he’s a lot of talk, too. I feel like he’s kinda like, ‘I know, I’m tired, I want to go home.’ But he actually does want to do well,” She said on the DWTS podcast. “Now he’s like, ‘I want to rehearse as much as I possibly can.’”
As for the judges comments and scores, Witney claims that she thought they were a bit harsh. “I thought that was a little uncalled for,” Witney stated. “I mean, he was moving, he was actually hitting the lines and trying to cha-cha. I felt like the threes were a little bit mean.”
Is There Tension Between Guillermo and Witney?
While Guillermo has been open about his nerves, at least one expert believes there may be more brewing beneath the surface. Body language expert Dr. Abbie Marono told the Daily Express US that she noticed a potential “difference in priorities” between Guillermo and Witney during their premiere performance.
“The potential tension is whether Witney is trying to build a shared partnership while Guillermo remains focused on his individual role as an entertainer,” Marono said, adding that Witney’s brief reaction to one of his comments “does not establish an off-camera argument, but the combination gives us a specific pressure point to watch.”
Marono said she’d like to see Guillermo “return her looks, acknowledge her encouragement, and include her in his reactions” going forward, something that could be key to keeping the pair off the bottom of the Dancing With The Stars leaderboard in Week 2.
Amanda Lynne focuses on human interest news, entertainment topics, and trending news. She has nearly 20 years of experience writing online news for several outlets.
