Tonight’s Dancing With The Stars Grand Finale was an act of perfection, as the star of stage and screen Lisa McCune beat out singing sensation Samantha Jade to take home the coveted Mirror Ball Trophy.
The five grand finalists – Samantha Jade, James Stewart, Nikki Osborne, Ant Middleton and Lisa McCune – performed their own expertly crafted Freestyle dance in the ultimate ballroom showdown.
Dancing a burlesque-inspired routine to her own recording ofShow Me How to Burlesque, Samantha kickstarted the show and received 38 points.
Home and Away hunk James Stewart scored 30 points for his masculine Freestyle dance, while Nikki Osbourne’s Argentine Tango inspired Freestyle received 31 points.
Ant Middleton channelled his inner gladiator with his performance, which Mark Wilson “loved from the start,” earning him 34 points.
Lisa topped the leaderboard with a perfect score for her old-school Hollywood-inspired performance, which Helen Richey called the stand out performance of the night.
After combing the judges scores with the audience vote, Nikki and James said goodbye.
Samantha, Ant and Lisa then re-performed their favourite dances from earlier in the series, where they received 38, 36 and 39 points respectively, before the studio audience cast their final vote.
Sonia Kruger and Chris Brown announced Ant Middleton had received the lowest votes – coming third in the competition – which left Samantha and Lisa to battle it out for the Mirror Ball Trophy.
Lisa was crowned Dancing With The Stars champion and was awarded $20,000 for her chosen charities, the RCD Foundation and the Harrison Reidel Foundation.
A humbled Lisa said: “I’m so thrilled” before praising her dancing partner Ian Waite.
With a shiny new Mirror Ball Trophy to added to her accolades, Lisa joked: “It will keep my Logies company.”
The final leaderboard for the night:
Lisa McCune and Ian Waite: 40 + 39
Samantha Jade and Gustavo Viglio: 38 + 38
Ant Middleton and Alex Vladimirov: 34 + 36
