DWTS Alum Talks Tough Season With Val Chmerkovskiy: ‘I Was in Tears’

Season 18 “Dancing With the Stars” alum Danica McKellar shared some details about her time on the show. During a chat with Cheryl Burke on the “Sex, Lies, and Spray Tans” podcast, McKellar revealed how tough things were.

“He was hard on me, but he gave me this really difficult choreography and he told me later like, yeah, ‘that was like a pro it was pro choreography that I gave you,'” she said on the November 17 podcast episode.

McKellar went on to explain just how dialed in her partner, Val Chmerkovskiy, was. The two finished the competition in 6th place.

Danica McKellar Said That Val Chmerkovskiy Was ‘Hard on Her’

During her chat with Burke, McKellar expressed how tough the season was, especially after the first week.

“Suddenly we had half the time to learn a dance, which felt like even less than half the time, and samba is challenging, very different from foxtrot,” she said.

And Chmerkovskiy definitely got more intense.

“He was like he was like charging at me, Like I thought, ‘is he gonna hit me?’ — obviously he wasn’t gonna hit me — but I will never forget and it’s like sweat was like flung off his face and I still will never forget that moment, and it’s very sobering,” she continued.

“It broke me. I was in tears because I didn’t know how to handle that kind of pressure. But it made me stronger. I mean, I’m grateful to Val because I like challenges. I like being pushed beyond what my comfort zone, so, I welcome that kind of thing,” she added.

Danica McKellar Said Maks Chmerkovskiy Didn’t Have an Interest in Working With Her

During switch-up week, McKellar danced with Chmerkovskiy’s older brother, Maks Chmerkovskiy. When Burke asked the biggest difference between the brothers, McKellar said that Maks Chmerkovskiy “wasn’t interested in teaching” her. Evidently, he had his ringer with Meryl Davis, and he was laser-focused on winning his first Mirrorball Trophy (which he did).

Some fans reacted to that specific comment on a Reddit thread.

“Not surprising at all, that Maks is like this ever. He at that point didn’t wanna teach anymore at all for a couple seasons, he just wanted a win and knew he had it with Meryl so why bother,” one person wrote.

“No real surprise – it was fairly obvious on screen. Maks had been checked out of the show for years, he more or less got gifted his win. Interestingly she said that she’d chose Gleb as her partner if she took part again,” another read.

“Danica was really good, but she was never going to win that season. Any other season, she could have gone much further. I felt so bad for her when Maks treated her the way he did simply because she wasn’t Meryl. If I recall, he just seemed really livid that someone else got Meryl for the week and took it out on Danica. She could have handled the tough choreography had he been willing to put in the time to teach,” a third Redditor added.