Breaking Down the Dancing With the Stars Cast By the Odds

DANCING WITH THE STARS – NANCY KERRIGAN WITH ARTEM CHIGVINTSEV- The celebrity cast of “Dancing with the Stars” are donning their glitzy wardrobe and slipping on their dancing shoes as they ready themselves for their first dance on the ballroom floor, as the season kicks off on MONDAY, MARCH 20 (8:00-10:01 p.m. EST), on the ABC Television Network. (ABC/Craig Sjodin)

Artem Chigvintsev: Nancy Kerrigan, the Olympic figure skater

Nancy Kerrigan is a skater with Olympic silver and bronze on her resume. When she won the former, she literally came as close to gold as it was possible for her to without winning it. But she’s more famous for being the victim of a crazy attack where the camp of rival Tonya Harding hired someone to whack her in the knee before the 1994 National Championships. Hollywood is currently working on a movie about all that, which is probably the biggest reason she’s here.

All figure skaters who have competed on the show, except the injured Dorothy Hamill, have at least made the semifinals, and two of them have won. Kerrigan’s older than any of them besides Hamill, but she’s not fully retired from the ice. She should prove a good dancer, maybe even a great one. At least barring injury, though she’s old enough to be more vulnerable to that than usual.

She and Artem Chigvintsev do have one problem, though: votes. She’s the kind of famous person everyone knows about but people don’t necessarily vote for. Figure skating fans and the general public both have mixed feelings about her. She doesn’t have a personality conducive to picking up fans either. There’s a chance these two could go out before they ought to.