A dejected Maïa Dunphy and dance partner Robert Rowiński spoke to Ryan Tubridy about being the third couple eliminated from Dancing with the Stars. Maïa was not for holding back. "I didn't think I'd be this upset," she said. "I was in bits last night!"
"I am disproportionately disappointed today, there's no point in denying it. For the last 2 months, you put your heart and soul into this show, it's such a juggernaut… It takes over your life."
A tantalizing tango earned Maïa her best comments to date but she was awarded the same points as the previous week and it wasn't enough to secure her place. She said at times, the critique was tough to take.
"Confidence is like a big lump of concrete. If you chip away at it every week, it's hard to build it back up. I was getting low scores every week so it was difficult but they were going in the right direction. Sunday was the first day when the judges gave us their comments and I thought, I'm not going home tonight because those comments were amazing. And then you get to the box, get the scores and you go, oh no, it was the same scores as last week, how can that be?"
When asked if she'll keep going with the dancing, Maïa joked (we think…),
"I will never dance again. I'm the dance equivalent of Miss Havisham. I'm going to sit upstairs in my attic in a tiny cha cha dress crying for the next 50 years."
Ryan is curious as to what drove Maïa to take part.
"I said, what are the positives, what are the negatives… I thought, there were no negatives apart from possibly falling on my butt on national television which I didn't do but it's been great. I'm fitter… I have abs for the first time in my life, and physical confidence. People think if you work in TV you must have physical confidence. I don't really. Week one, I had this slightly more modest dress and Robert came in and said you're not wearing that, you're wearing this and held up a dress that was so small I wasn't sure if it was very far away or meant for a doll!"
Maïa describes the show as "an amazing experience" and reckons we're going to see Jake and Anna in the finals.
Click here to listen to The Ryan Tubridy Show