DC ExtraTime: Dancing with a Star in Night School

BY DC CUEVA                     

■ @DC408Dxtr  @ TW / IG / YT

During this past year, The Challenge has had another trilogy to dovetail with what we've been seeing with Dirty 30, Vendettas and the current season of Final Reckoning. Before the three-season saga began last year, it had the chance to fulfill the fantasy of everyone who calls this show "the fifth major pro sport" by asking who is better: the Champs aka the Veterans who you see each week on the regular shows, or the Pros & Stars from sports, entertainment and beyond who were asked to go up against the incumbent establishment.
   Over three seasons, The Challenge's spinoff series, Champs vs. Pros/Stars, saw Olympians, former athletes, musicians, a couple former reality stars and even a hip-hop star's socially active sister go up against Bananas, Cara, CT and the rest of The Challenge's finest, with Victor Cruz and then The Miz taking over for TJ Lavin as emcee. From seeing T.O. go at it with C.T. to Louise Hazel drawing limes out to determine elimination opponents... Hennessy Carolina's blow-out and Bananas & Wes going at it in elimination, Champs vs. Stars offered some juicy competition and drama in between seasons of our favorite show. But above all else, it's charity that brought them all together: all the players' efforts benefited the causes and foundations they care deeply about.
​   After Cara Maria took the winner's paycheck on Vendettas which was shoved into the last minutes of another long, dragged out two-part reunion came the premiere of Champs vs. Stars II, which also saw things mix up after an almost perfect season by the Champs when Bananas, Emily and CT reigned supreme in CVS I, as well as Cara & Darrell settling unfinished business winning Champs vs. Pros. There, the twist saw both Champs AND Stars competing on two different teams for most of the season until just before the final when they were all paired up. It made for the most competitive and entertaining of the spinoff's three seasons, and one of its stars is the person of our focus.


Of all those Stars who got to challenge a team of Champs -- one in reality had three actual titlists in the field, we had our first two-time celebrity competitor, Louise Hazel, who turned out to be Wes' equal during the course of that season. But while everyone was pegging for her to be the first Star to cross over into the main Challenge series, she was beaten to the punch by Jozea -- who by way of his Big Brother status got him into Final Reckoning with his vendetta (and now cult favorite), Da'Vonne. And perhaps, there could be more on the way for the man they also call "Tony Montana."

However, the one who had the most reviled persona of the Stars going in - and eventually when the dust settled on that season was that of Beau "Casper" Smart. To many - and even after the season, he is best known to them as one of the exes of Jennifer Lopez. but from looking at his CV, he might be to Champs vs. Stars what fellow dancer Asaf is to Are You The One -- the one that has many sides to him in having a broader resume among Team Stars.
   The O.C. native was a saxophone player in high school, but then turned his attention to something that can get him more time in front of the stage than in the back. At age 18, Casper got his feet wet for the first time in dancing when he took up the hip-hop influenced dance style of krumping. A year later, he competed in a dance contest put on by choreography icon Debbie Allen and took down the $1,000 first prize, which translated to him performing as part of the Tommy the Clown dance crew.
   It then turned into not only being a dancer himself but also becoming a choreographer. Casper got to design the choreography for Beyonce's "Who Run The World," directed Nicki Minaj's moves in the vid for "Anaconda," and also has worked with Ariana, Lil' Wayne, Nick Jonas, Mike Posner, Skylar Gray, Eminem, Flo-Rida and Becky G., among others. And in front of the camera, you've seen him in Glee, Step Up 3D, The Big Bang Theory and last year's TV remake of Dirty Dancing.

And it's the status he enjoys in Tinseltown that brought him to the notoriety he has to bear: co-director and head choreographer for the 2012 Dance Again World Tour with Jennifer Lopez. A year before while he was a backup dancer for her, J.Lo and Casper became an item both on- and off-stage. That romance became official while on that tour and lasted for five years until she called time on it in summer 2016 upon gossip swirling that he got caught in the act cheating on her. And a week after she received the Video Vanguard Award at the MTV Video Music Awards last month, J.Lo and new boyfriend, Alex Rodriguez, narrowly avoided a run-in with the ex at a West Hollywood restaurant.
   Given that he is one who enjoys training in combat sports, taking advantage of that SoCal way of life outdoors going boarding on the snow and water and riding motorcycles, it was inevitable that, if MTV wanted, that they would target Casper to be on a celebrity version of The Challenge. And as part of the Stars team, he quickly embraced the role of villain in the group who backed it all up by competing just as well as anyone this spring. After taking out Arian Foster in the first elimination, it was only in the homestretch when the teams were pairs up did he take advantage of his athletic skills: two time did he and Louise get put into elimination, and both times did they win. In between those, they won the 8th week's challenge, and in that close final they finished 2nd to CT and Tony.

The fall movie season is just now starting, and one of the first big-name flicks of the fall drops next weekend. Night School stars Kevin Hart - who co-hosted Wednesday's Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon as part of the comedy's promotional blitz (and who Kailah got to meet last year) - and Tiffany Haddish, who hosted this year's MTV Movie & TV Awards and has her second big movie of the year after her starring gig in Uncle Drew. Night School documents a group of adults, who got in a lot of trouble while they were kids and were thrown out of school then, and who are then given a second chance by attending adult ed classes at night with the hope that they can pass a GED and receive their diplomas years after the fact.
   A popular marketing element for any popular film featuring big name stars these days is getting to do a special vignette to tie-in to a TV series or a sponsor. During her original Real World season five years ago, Averey from RW Portland and two Challenges, as well as fellow roommate Joi who left the house early to make way for Hurricane Nia, collaborated with Seth Rogan and James Franco for a send-up of their apocalypse-themed comedy This Is The End. That strategy has also stretched to Universal Studios collaborating with The Challenge giving the likes of Hunter, Laurel, Shane and Zach a chance to do what they do best at Universal Florida.
   In the case of Casper, he was brought on the Spanish-language network Univision and Universal Pictures (whose corporate parent, Comcast, ironically owns Univision's rival Telemundo) to help Kevin and Tiffany do some salsa dancing, with the help of Clarissa Molina, a Dominican-American model who represented her homeland at the 2015 Miss Universe pageant and then was crowned 2016 Nuestra Belleza Latina, the network's beauty pageant series. Below, find out if Kevin and Tiffany can master an art Casper and Clarissa have perfected.

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