The Dancing with the Stars franchise will expand – once again – this summer with Dancing with the Stars: The Next Pro. It will premiere on Monday, July 13, at 8/7c on ABC. The new episodes will then stream on Hulu the next day. It’s a new kind of competition show for the franchise. Rather than seeing the tried-and-true formula of pairings of professional dancers and celebrities, this show opens up to something entirely different: rising dancers competing against each other. This new spinoff series isn’t the first. That spot belongs to the one-off Dancing with the Stars: Juniors. On which, Dancing with the Stars pro Rylee Arnold and troupe member Hailey Bills competed with celebrity partners. Dancing with the Stars: The Next Pro is the latest addition to the ever-expanding franchise.
It comes after a record-breaking season of Dancing with the Stars, celebrating 20 years of the reality competition series. During that season, former host Tom Bergen returned to the ballroom as a guest judge and suggested that the show should bring back its elimination episodes. Dancing with the Stars moved away from its twice-weekly shows with Season 17 in 2013. The following year, the reality competition show stopped producing two seasons a year.
Now, it’s more common for a Dancing with the Stars season to air in the fall, and Dancing with the Stars: Live to take some of the professional dancers – and a few celebrity guests, including the Len Goodmoon Mirrorball Trophy winners – on tour afterwards. Last year, the franchise also launched The Dancing with the Stars Official Podcast hosted by The Bachelor star and Season 33 Champion, Joey Graziadei. For the first time, there will also be a Dancing with the Stars Con in California for one weekend later this summer. That convention has faced pushback from fans about ticket pricing and its exclusivity to one place.
Nevertheless, those additions reflect the professional ballroom dancers becoming celebrities in their own right after two decades. It helps that social media has created even less distance between the celebrities, the pros, and Dancing with the Stars fans. Now, with Dancing with the Stars: The Next Pro, there is more Dancing with the Stars than ever before. But will it be what fans want?
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What Is Dancing with the Stars: The Next Pro About?
Dancing with the Stars: The Next Pro will follow “12 exceptional up-and-coming dancers who move into one house and compete in a grueling audition process, all vying for a coveted spot as a pro dancer” on Dancing with the Stars Season 35. The teaser trailer reveals some of the dancers, who are more well-known than the “up-and-coming” description suggests. Dancing with the Stars fans will immediately notice Stephani Sosa, who was a part of the show’s troupe during Season 34 in 2024. Ezra Sosa, her brother, is a current pro on the show, making it to the finals with his partner and Olympic gymnast Jordan Chiles last season.
There are also glimpses of The Next Step’s Briar Nolet and AJ Pritchard, who was a professional dancer in four seasons of the BBC’s Strictly Come Dancing. Jake Monreal is also one of the competitors, and he competed on that one season of Dancing with the Stars: Juniors. So, it’ll be interesting to see how Dancing with the Stars: The Next Pro does (or doesn’t) address those familiarities.
Wildlife conservationist and Season 34 Mirrorball Champion Robert Irwin will host the new show. Meanwhile, three-time Mirrorball champion Mark Ballas and his mother, Shirley Ballas, “The Queen of Latin” and head Strictly Come Dancing judge, will be judges. They won’t be the only ones, either! They will be joined by returning pros, who will serve as rotating mentors and guest judges.
Details about those returning pros and the show’s contestants will be announced at a later date. Dancing with the Stars: The Next Pro is produced by BBC Studios. Conrad Green serves as showrunner and executive producer. Ryan O’Dowd, Krystal Whitney, Alex Cross, and Jenny Groom are executive producers. Deena Katz and Quinn Lipton are co-executive producers.
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What Does It Mean for Dancing with the Stars Season 35?
Undoubtedly, Dancing with the Stars Season 35 will have a new professional dancer. It’s unclear what that means for the returning pros. Last season, those were Jenna Johnson, Valentin Chmerkovskiy, Daniella Karagach, Pasha Pashkov, Britt Stewart, Alan Bersten, Emma Slater, Brandon Armstrong, Witney Carson, Gleb Savchenko, and Ezra Sosa. While Sasha Farber did not return as a pro after Season 33, Mark Ballas did after being a guest judge in Season 33. Pro Jan Ravnik joined after the success of Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour.
So, Dancing with the Stars Season 34 had 14 professional ballroom dancers and 14 celebrities. It’s unclear if that number will change with this new pro. Will someone leave the ballroom again, or will the number of pairings just grow as it has in the past? Dancing with the Stars Season 28 had 12 couples in 2019, while Season 31 had 16 couples in 2022. Anything is possible, especially with the show’s popularity growing. Will they go back to two seasons a year to accommodate a larger cast? It’s hard to imagine Dancing with the Stars would want to lose any of the pros. They have become so beloved that they’re on a successful tour and have a convention around the corner. Why mess with that?
Plus, Dancing with the Stars: The Next Pro is only going to continue that pattern of connection. Throughout the competition series, audiences will get to know the future pro – not to the same magnitude that they know the likes of the show’s tenured pros, but still. That level of investment has the potential to elevate Dancing with the Stars Season 35. This new pro will have a fanbase coming into the show that will give them even more of a chance to take home the Len Goodman Mirrorball Trophy. We may already know their partner, too! The Traitors and Love Island’s Maura Higgins and Summer House’s Ciara Miller have been announced as the first celebrities of Dancing with the Stars Season 35.
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