'Dancing With the Stars' Benches Val Chmerkovskiy Over Oscars Slap Post

The pro nodded to Will Smith's Oscars slap after judge Carrie Ann Inaba critiqued his wife, and he'll miss Dedication Night.

On Tuesday's "Dancing With the Stars," two backup dancers swung Harry Shum Jr. off the floor so he could backflip. Judge Carrie Ann Inaba called it an illegal lift and read the definition of one aloud to his pro partner, Jenna Johnson, TV Insider reported.

Four days later, Johnson's husband is off the show. Val Chmerkovskiy, a pro on the ABC competition since its second season, won't dance in next week's episode after a post that appeared to reference Will Smith's 2022 Oscars slap. In a statement Saturday, BBC Studios called the post inappropriate and said the well-being of everyone who works on the show is "non-negotiable," Variety reported. That covers the person at the judges' table, too.

The bench lasts one week, TheWrap reported, and it lands on more people than Chmerkovskiy. His celebrity partner, Jenna Dewan, will still dance Dedication Night, paired with Alan Bersten, a pro who went out in week three, Variety confirmed. Their number is a Viennese waltz to "Unchained Melody," dedicated to Dewan's mother.

Johnson took the original note on air. TV Insider reported that she told co-host Julianne Hough she understood where Inaba was coming from, and that she later talked to the judge privately.

Her husband didn't let it go. "You almost saw Fresh Prince enter the ballroom last night," Chmerkovskiy wrote on his TikTok story, according to Variety. That read as a nod to Smith slapping Chris Rock at the Oscars, then yelling at him to keep his wife's name out of his mouth.

The post came down fast, but not fast enough. Inaba saw it and put a screenshot on Instagram, thanking the news outlets that had flagged it for her, TV Insider reported.

She's talked before about the ballroom as a hard place to work. In a Variety interview during Season 34, Inaba said she's been a target since the show's chat-room days and gets booed in a way fellow judges Derek Hough and Bruno Tonioli don't. "It's not so much that I get hurt as I get afraid," she told Variety. She said she shrinks a little as each season goes on.

Chmerkovskiy had already apologized. In an Instagram Story on Thursday, he said he'd contacted Inaba directly and promised to stop and think before posting, Variety reported. The show benched him two days later anyway.

After the news, he said in a second statement that he'd grabbed a meme to defend his wife and never thought through what else it might suggest. "Carrie Ann certainly didn't deserve to get caught in the middle of my bad judgment, and I hate that she was," he wrote, as quoted by Variety.

TV Insider reported that the competition picks back up Oct. 20, with Inaba at the judges' table and Johnson back on the floor. Chmerkovskiy said he'll be watching. He won't be in the ballroom.

Source: Variety, retrieved October 18, 2026. Other sources: tvinsider.com, TheWrap.