HOLLYWOOD—After months of teasing the full cast for the upcoming season of the 2023 reality competition “Dancing With the Stars” it was FINALLY released on Wednesday, September 13. We knew back in July that “Vanderpump Rules” star Ariana Madix who was part of the Scandoval that rocked reality TV would be competing on the dance floor.
Earlier this week it was revealed that the sister of Britney Spears, Jamie Lynn Spears and the recent “Bachelorette” Charity Lawson would be competing. My big concern is the cast this year is lackluster, if I’m being honest. I want that major star power for such a series, but that isn’t the case. Also, it doesn’t help when you have hosts playing ring-around-the-rosey. I mean you had stand outs with Tom Bergeron and Samantha Harris. I loved that pairing, then we lost Harris who was replaced with Brooke Burke Charvet.
We ultimately lost Brooke after several seasons and earned Erin Andrews. Andrews and Bergeron were eventually out and we got Tyra Banks. She was out and then we got Alfonso Riberio. So now the new hosts are Riberio and former dancing pro Julianne Hough. We will see how that works. It also hurt the series that it went from ABC to Disney +. Sorry I’m not paying money to stream a single series on a streaming service. I’m just not doing it. Not going to happen.
With that said there is a bit of star power. We have Supermodel Tyson Beckford with partner Jenna Johnson; Marvel actor Xochitl Gomez with Val Chmerkovskiy; NFL star Adrian Peterson and partner Britt Stewart; Oscar-winner Mira Sorvino and partner Gleb Savchenko; Actor/Comedian Matt Walsh and partner Koko Iwasaki; “Brady Bunch” star Barry Williams and partner Peta Murgatroyd.
We have singer Lele Pons with partner Brandon Armstrong; there is singer Jason Mraz and partner Danielle Karagach; Actress and star of “How I Met Your Mother” Alyson Hannigan with partner Sasha Farber. Social media and reality star Harry Jowsey and partner Rylee Arnold and rounding out the cast is real estate titan Mauricio Umansky, who also appears on the Bravo series “The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills.”
The good thing about the new season is the series is returning to ABC. It will stream on Disney + while the show airs on ABC. Look at it this way, if you have Disney + you can stream the episodes, if you don’t, you can watch it for free this year. Whether it entertains or not is up for debate. The new season premieres Tuesday, September 26 at 8 p.m. EST on ABC.
