Dancing With the Stars fans will just have to find another invitation to the ballroom after Season 34 contestant Whitney Leavitt and pro partner Mark Ballas had to call off their ticket giveaway.
“So, we have some bad news,” Leavitt, a really star from The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives, said in a TikTok video she posted on Friday. “We just got out of rehearsal, and we were both informed that we actually can’t do a giveaway for the Dancing with the Stars live show.”
A day earlier, Leavitt and Ballas announced they were giving away tickets to the live show, Deadline reports, and according to a fan on Reddit, they said in a now-deleted TikTok video that flights and accommodations were included.
@whitneyleavittwe’re gunna get creative and find a way to make it up to you! 💕💗love you guys! ♬ original sound – Whitney Leavitt
In Friday’s video, however, the duo revealed that ABC, the network that airs Dancing with the Stars, and BBC Studios, the production company behind the reality competition, put the kibosh on the giveaway.
“This has come directly from ABC and BBC, and is completely out of our hands,” Ballas said.
Leavitt added, “It just really sucks because Mark and I just want to do something really special for you guys that have shown us so much support and love, for us and the show. We’re gonna get creative. We’re gonna think of something to give away.”
And Ballas said, “We’ll think of something else to do for you guys to show how grateful we are.”
In the Reddit thread, fans speculated about the news. “I feel like the there was an issue with it being a contest. So production made them cancel it,” one commenter wrote. “I don’t think Mark knew, though, because pros [have] invited fans to live shows before. Mark invited a fan last week. Val [Chmerkovskiy] also invited and got flights/hotels for one of his biggest fans. But both those situations were on the DL.”
Another person wrote, “Yeah, I think those situations being on the DL [plus] being a specific gift to one person made a big difference. Though I wouldn’t be surprised if production will clamp down on pros giving fans tickets or makes the pros/fans follow certain rules. They won’t want to go anywhere near the implication that pros are ‘buying’ votes.”
Dancing With the Stars, Season 34, Tuesdays, 8/7c, ABC