“People always wanted to see more of us,” says Christi Lukasiak, one of the breakout stars on Lifetime’s long-running hit reality dance show “Dance Moms.” Eleven years after the show’s 2011 debut, she and Kelly Hyland, best friends and fan-favorite duo, are giving the people what they want by reacting to the show’s pilot episode “The Competition Begins.” With glasses of wine in hand, they relive the show’s most famous scenes, offer insider memories and trivia, and fill in what was often the chasm between reality and reality TV.

While the audience watched their young daughters master and perform intricate choreography as members of Abby Lee Miller’s dance studio in Pittsburgh, Christi and Kelly, along with the other moms on the show, were subject to their own choreography of sorts behind the scenes. As normal suburban moms, they were unprepared for how much of the show was fabricated and subject to multiple takes, how differently they and their children would be portrayed on TV, and how much criticism they would receive from viewers for the silliest things.

On this episode of Back to the Barre, Christi and Kelly set the record straight, address longrunning questions they’ve received from fans over the years, and decide which, if any, of their outfits they would ever wear again.

Quotes

“The thing that I think is the most fun, or the part that’s really interesting is that we lived it. So there’s so much that we can talk about that people never saw.” (2:30-2:40 | Christi)

“I do think that’s one of the reasons why the show was really successful, because it wasn’t in New York or L.A. We were just normal Pittsburgh people.” (11:08-11:18 | Christi) 

“What people don’t realize is when we were in pyramid, it’s three seconds on the show, but it took us hours and hours to film.” (15:26-15:36 | Kelly) 

“It was just to humiliate us. She just needed a reason to humiliate us.”(19:23-19:27 | Kelly)

“That was our first big red flag of editing mistakes. Where did that come from? That wasn’t there when we were filming.” (23:48-23:56 | Christi and Kelly)

“And that was my first real ‘Holy shit. People are going to hate us for stupid reasons’ moment.” (30:24-30:30 | Christi)

“That’s what they always did and it made Paige look like a crybaby. Meanwhile she was tortured….But they don’t show that.” (40:17-40:29 | Kelly) 

“When I talk to people they say, ‘Oh, Abby was so mean.’ I’m thinking to myself, ‘Are you kidding me?! You think she’s that mean and they only showed ten minutes of it?” 40:35-40:47 | Kelly) 

“That’s what was so hard a lot of the time for me–the way she treated my kids. She was like my family. Her mom and her would come to Paige and Brooke’s baptisms and communions and things. And then you treat them like that and not care about their feelings.” (43:33-43:52 | Kelly) 

“I always thought Brooke had an unfair edit because I think that Brooke is way more fun than they ever showed her to be. And she was always the most caring. She always took care of those kids, and they just showed her as the miserable little bitch.” (46:34:46:47 | Christi and Kelly)

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