Inaugural Balls: The Obamas, the Bidens, Piers Morgan and Chris Tucker

The Obamas had their first dance to a Jennifer Hudson cover of “Let’s Stay Together,” and the Bidens were serenaded by Jamie Foxx singing “I Can’t Stop Loving You.” But there was another dance to watch during the inaugural balls: That of CNN’s indoor coverage, which had to juggle politics and a party. The tone was set early when Piers Morgan and Erin Burnett tried to interview San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro and Rep. Joaquin Castro while Rihanna’s “Please Don’t Stop the Music” blared in the background. Ultimately, Piers just gave up:

Piers: By the way, I’ve never met any Latino that can’t dance, so are you guys gonna be — [Julian and Joaquin laugh and say he just met his first two].

Erin: Pierce’s first highly inappropriate comment of the evening.

Piers: That’s not inappropriate. I never have.

In case you were wondering, I’d say Piers’ second inappropriate comment came when he segued from a taped interview with performer Stevie Wonder to a live chat with the Black Eyed Peas will.i.am by referring to him as “almost as big a legend now in the music world as Stevie Wonder.”

Other highlights:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JrJBhZ1dcrU

Let’s interview Chris Tucker! Tucker apparently had the crowd dancing to Michael Jackson while waiting to go live on CNN, so Piers ended the interview dancing with him in their seats. Tucker couldn’t hear Piers and Erin at first, so the sound in their earpieces had been turned up — which led to Erin’s most inappropriate statement of the night: “This is sorta like getting an audio enema. You feel it in your entire body.”

• Let’s interview The West Wing‘s Toby Ziegler, Richard Schiff!

Toby Ziegler is, in Piers’ opinion, the “greatest dramatic character in the history of television.” He just watched all seven seasons of The West Wing for the third time. Frankly, I would have preferred to see them have a West Wing trivia contest than talk about gun control — which happened after Schiff thought the interview was ending and said, “And thank you for not asking me about guns. ‘Cause I would get very upset.” It’s a serious conversation that needs to continue, just not at this event. The cameraman agreed. Cut to this exciting shot of nothing:

Performances to remember:

The First Couple’s first dance: At the second ball though, they were looser, singing along a bit. Hudson didn’t get a lot of screen time, did she?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qylYmjx4Q1s

The Bidens’ first dance: He knows how to hold a woman close.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6NRURMttj4k

Alicia Keys performed “Obama on Fire” instead of “Girl on Fire.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YboP9kjG1Ok

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