Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
The Schmooze

Bizarre Russian ‘Dancing With the Stars’ Video Features Nazi Dancing to Sinatra

A recent episode of Russia’s “Dancing With the Stars” features a Foxtrotting Nazi dancing to Frank Sinatra’s “Fly Me to the Moon.”

During the dance, actor Alexander Petrov plays a World War II German soldier chancing upon an abandoned piano as dancer Anastasia Antelava, playing a Russian woman, hides in fear. Within moments, Antelava disarms him and the two launch into a dance. That is, until she is shot dead mid spin. Petrov fires his rifle into the air, but is also killed.

The result is one of the most head-scratching videos we have seen in a while and induced more than a few “what the [bleep]?” comments around the newsroom.

Image by YouTube

Creators of the show, which airs on Russia’s state-owned Rossiya-1, have since apologized for the April 10 telecast of the dance. According to the statement, Petrov choreographed the dance to tell the story of “a tragic, doomed love between a Russian woman and a German, which causes him to drop his weapon and to die with her.”

Either way, we don’t think Sinatra would approve.

Watch the dance here:

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.