Kym Johnson-Herjavec opened up about her return to Dancing with the Stars—and the vibe at the judges’ table. The veteran pro dancer, who won two Mirrorball trophies on the ABC dancing competition, returned to the ballroom as a guest judge for Season 35’s Dedication Night and weighed in on the headline-making exchange between Jenna Johnson and judge Carrie Ann Inaba.
“The judges are there to do a job and they’re going to give their critique,” Johnson-Herjavec, 50, told Us Weekly. “I never spoke back, back in the old days. If Len [Goodman] said something, I’d be like, ‘OK.’”
“But you know, if you do a lift and you don’t think you do, I think it was fine for Jenna to be like, ‘A lift?’ because she was probably confused about what it was,” the dancer continued. “I think she said it in a very nice way.”
During Season 35’s Super Bowl Night, Inaba called out Johnson for an illegal lift in her samba with actor Harry Shum Jr. after two male dancers lifted Shum.
“You need to put more content into your dances,” Inaba said. “And there was a lift.”
“A lift?” Johnson asked, as Inaba read the rule from a piece of paper: “A lift is any movement during which one of the dancers has both feet off the floor at the same time with the assistance or support of their partner. Yeah, lift,” she said.
Johnson took the criticism well, telling Extra after the show, “Usually when someone’s called out for a lift, it’s when your partner lifts you. So I was definitely unaware of, like, two guys that weren’t myself, rolling back Harry and lifting him. But I absolutely hear Carrie Ann.”
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Still, the incident caused a major ruckus with DWTS pros past and present.
Former DWTS pro Maksim Chmerkovskiy told The Viall Files podcast that Inaba’s lift call was wrong because it was performed by troupe members, not by Johnson.
In a TikTok video, longtime pro Gleb Savchenko agreed, noting that the lift “wasn’t done in the couple.” He also called Inaba “the lift police of Dancing With the Stars,” but added that she was just doing her job.
In a video posted to Instagram, original Dancing with the Stars pro Louis Van Amstel said that while he agreed with Inaba’s call, she wasn’t always “consistent” with using the rule.
In addition, Johnson’s husband, Val Chmerkovskiy, was suspended from the competition for a week after posting a controversial social media comment aimed at Inaba. He has since apologized.
The lift drama was put aside for the Dedication Night that Johnson-Herjavec participated in.
Speaking with Us, the Australian dancer described Dedication Night as very “positive.”
“Everyone was like, ‘Let’s make this about the celebrities and who they’re dedicating the dance to,’ and Carrie Anne’s like, ‘Yeah, that’s what tonight is about,’” she shared. “So it felt very joyous, and there was a lot of love in the ballroom that night.”
Related: DWTS’ Gleb Savchenko Defends His Comments About Alan Bersten: ‘I Didn’t Attack Him’
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