Grey, 50, who co-starred in the 1987 movie 'Dirty Dancing', was named champion at the end of a two-hour broadcast.
Actress Jennifer Grey won television’s “Dancing With the Stars” contest on Tuesday, while Bristol Palin, whose survival on the show sparked nationwide controversy, finished in third place.
Grey, 50, who co-starred with the late Patrick Swayze in the 1987 movie “Dirty Dancing”, was named champion at the end of a two-hour broadcast and a record number of public votes.
Kyle Massey, 19, a former child star on the Disney Channel show “That’s So Raven,” was runner-up.
Grey, who danced through much of the season with injuries and said she suffered a ruptured disc in her back on Monday, had been the front-runner after scoring consistently high marks from the judges.
But her claim on the mirror ball trophy seemed at risk as Palin, the daughter of conservative politician Sarah Palin, waltzed into the finals on a tide of public support despite coming bottom with the judges for more than six weeks.
“This has been a life-changing experience,” the 20-year-old single mom said of her third-place finish. “I am very blessed to be here. I’ve had a ball.”
Palin again scored the lowest with judges in her final tango and cha cha cha dances on Tuesday, but was praised for her improvement over the last three months.
The winner was determined by a combination of scores from the three judges and what producers said was a record amount of email and phone votes from the audience at home of more than 20 million viewers.
The record voting activity briefly crashed the ABC TV show website on Monday night, producers said, but “affected each finalist equally”.
Palin’s progress to the finals had sparked a furor over whether she was benefiting over the popularity of her mother at the expense of other more talented contestants.
Last week, one angry man blasted his TV set with a shotgun while watching the show, and an envelope filled with what turned out to be talcum powder turned up on the show’s Los Angeles set.
Palin shrugged off the controversy, calling her critics ”haters” who were waiting for her to fail.
Grey, on the other hand, is a trained dancer who proved an early favorite. Best known for playing the naive teen Frances ”Baby” Houseman in the coming-of-age movie “Dirty Dancing,” she won hearts with emotional recollections of performing with Swayze more than 20 years ago. Swayze died of pancreatic cancer in September 2009 at the age of 57.
On Tuesday, Grey scored another perfect 30 for her Viennese waltz, which judge Bruno Toniolo called “blissfully beautiful”.
Asked what she would miss most about “Dancing with the Stars”, Grey replied simply, “Dancing.”
“Dancing With the Stars” has enjoyed one of the best seasons in its five year history on U.S. television. More than 23 million viewers tuned in for Monday’s finale, making it the most-watched show in the United States that night.
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