Giovanni Pernice will NOT return to Strictly Come Dancing, BBC confirms
Giovanni Pernice will not return to 'Strictly Come Dancing'.
The 33-year-old dancer has appeared as a professional on the BBC Latin and ballroom show for almost a decade but in recent weeks , he has been the centre of allegations of "threatening and abusive behaviour" towards his former partners on the series and now the broadcaster has confirmed he will not be a part of this year's competition.
On Monday (10.06.24), the BBC unveiled the list of professionals who will take part in the upcoming series - which is due to air from September - and it included Dianne Buswell, Nadiya Bychkova, Graziano Di Prima, Amy Dowden, Karen Hauer, Katya Jones, Neil Jones, Nikita Kuzmin, Gorka Marquez, Luba Mushtuk, Jowita Przystal, Johannes Radebe, Kai Widdrington, Nancy Xu, Carlos Gu, Lauren Oakley, Michelle Tsiakkas and Vito Coppola.
Giovanni has rejected all the claims made against him and said he "forward to clearing [his] name."
The dancing champion first took part in the series in 2015, when he and 'Coronation Street' actress Georgia May Foote finished as runners up and in 2023, he competed with 'Sherlock' star Amanda Abingdon, but their time on the show was short-lived when she left and cited "personal reasons" as the reason behind her early exit.
Immediately after the news broke, Amanda deleted her social media platforms on Instagram and X.
Towards the end of May, it was revealed Giovanni’s future on ‘Strictly’ was uncertain after the dancer became jaded with the “scrutiny” he had faced for the allegations made against him about his teaching methods, and wanted to turn his attention to other shows instead.
A friend of the performer's told The Sun: “Gio feels the scrutiny on him has become too much, and now is the time to make a fresh start.
“He wants to focus on other TV projects, and feels he’s achieved all he can on Strictly, having won the trophy back in 2021 and reaching the final an unprecedented four times.”
They added: “He remains adamant he’s done nothing wrong other than being a hard taskmaster but knows his style of training isn’t to everyone’s liking — especially in this day and age. He has a lot of other exciting projects in the pipeline right now, and he’s just super-excited to get cracking on them. This, now, is his priority.”
