ABC’s newest reality competition proved summer television doesn’t have to be a rerun wasteland.
“On THE NEXT PRO, we’re watching — these aren’t celebrity contestants that have given ballroom dancing a go; these are the best in the industry, so it is hard,” host Robert Irwin told GOOD MORNING AMERICA ahead of the show’s launch. “It is really, really hard.”
DANCING WITH THE STARS: THE NEXT PRO premiered Monday, July 13, on ABC, and the bet paid off. The spinoff pulled in 5.33 million total viewers over three days of viewing across ABC, Disney+, Hulu, and digital platforms, according to Nielsen figures reported by Deadline. That made it ABC’s best summer series premiere in six years and the network’s strongest summer series debut across all genres since July 2020.
The premiere held up even before the streaming numbers rolled in. On linear television alone, the episode topped the night with 4.42 million viewers and a 0.47 rating among adults 18-49, Deadline reported. Once same-day streaming got folded into the total, that 18-49 rating climbed to 0.86, good enough to make it the best alternative-series premiere of the entire television season on broadcast or cable, outside of anything that landed an NFL lead-in.
Twelve aspiring ballroom dancers make up the cast, each working through a multi-step audition process for a permanent job: professional dancer on DANCING WITH THE STARS Season 35 this fall. Mark Ballas and Shirley Ballas serve as the show’s resident judges, joined by a rotating slate of guest judges week to week. Producers shot the season near Irwin’s home turf outside Australia Zoo in Queensland, Australia.
Related: Everything We Know About DANCING WITH THE STARS: THE NEXT PRO
“We actually filmed THE NEXT PRO right down the road from Australia Zoo,” Irwin told GOOD MORNING AMERICA. “Showing all of my dance family Australia Zoo, welcoming them in, I got them their own khaki uniforms — they’re in there cuddling koalas and wrangling crocodiles.”
Irwin knows the format from the other side of the judges’ table. He won Season 34 last fall with partner Witney Carson, and that finale drew 5.5 million live-and-same-day viewers, proof the flagship show still out-dances its rookie spinoff, even during a summer stretch this strong for the newcomer.
“That’s what sets DANCING WITH THE STARS apart,” Irwin said of the advice he passes along to new pros and contestants now. “It’s so much more than dancing. We can tell a message.”
Movieguide® has kept an eye on the DANCING WITH THE STARS franchise for reasons beyond the ratings. Pros Maksim Chmerkovskiy and Peta Murgatroyd presented at this year’s Movieguide® Faith & Values Awards Gala, and the husband-and-wife duo told Movieguide® on the red carpet that the ceremony’s mission overlaps with their own household.
“All we’re trying to do right now are — literally the foundation of our day — is setting good values in the three beautiful boys that we have at home,” Chmerkovskiy said. “So, when we got the invitation to do it, it’s like literally the verbiage is exactly what our life is all about at the moment.”
“Because it is so much about family with Movieguide®, with everything that’s going on in the world right now, the world is crazy,” Murgatroyd added. “You know, it can be a very dark place, and it’s so nice to be able to have these types of movies being brought to families.”
THE NEXT PRO isn’t pitched as faith-based programming, and parents can expect the same glittering costumes and competitive edge that define its parent show. But a spinoff built around mentorship and 12 dancers chasing a break the honest way is a fairly wholesome hook for a summer hit, and six years after ABC’s last big summer swing landed, plenty of families were apparently glad to tune in.
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