How Dancing with the Stars turns judges' marks into percentages
On Dancing with the Stars, a perfect score from the judges does not decide who stays. Each couple's points are converted into a share of everything the judges handed out that night, then added to their share of the public vote, and the couple with the smallest combined total usually goes home.
The American version of Britain's Strictly Come Dancing premiered on ABC on June 1, 2005, pairing celebrities with professional dancers for ballroom and Latin routines. Each judge scores from 1 to 10. If a team earns 20 points on a night when the judges award 200 in total, its judges' share is 10 percent, and that figure is combined with the percentage of North American votes it received. Only in the first two seasons did the rankings alone matter; from season three onward, the exact numbers count. The all-star fifteenth season even allowed half points.
Voting has had its loopholes. Fans can vote by phone, online and text, up to the number of couples performing or five, whichever is higher. In 2010 it emerged that the contestant Kate Gosselin had emailed friends and family asking them to vote up to ten times each, and The Washington Post reported that online voting did not seem to need a valid email address. From season 28 the judges could rescue one of the bottom two couples, a power scrapped again in season 32.
Money and paperwork sometimes made news. Beth Stern said on her husband Howard's radio show in 2006 that she was guaranteed 125,000 dollars just for appearing, with more for lasting longer. When Bindi Irwin competed as a minor in season 21, a Los Angeles court held back her pay because her father had not signed the contract; once his death certificate was produced, she received 350,000 dollars.
The rehearsals are brutal. The volleyball star Misty May-Treanor ruptured an Achilles tendon practising a jive, and the singer Jewel fractured both tibias before her season even started. Tom Bergeron hosted the first 28 seasons, and after head judge Len Goodman died in April 2023, the prize became the Len Goodman Mirrorball Trophy.
Source: Dancing with the Stars (American TV series)
