dancing with the stars

Julianne and Derek Hough Will Return to Lord Over Dancing With the Stars for Season 23

Television Academy Hosts Cocktail Reception For The 67th Emmy Award Nominees For Outstanding Choreography
Photo: Angela Weiss/Getty Images

The national nightmare that was the Hough Drought on ABC’s Dancing With the Stars has, at long last, come to a merciful close, as the most agile dancing Mormon siblings ever to grace prime-time television (it’s no contest, Osmonds) will return to the stage they helped build for the show’s upcoming 23rd season. Derek will be back on the floor as a pro dancer and Julianne will return to the judge’s table after both took a year off to dazzle America with their show Move Live on Tour. Julianne took her first spin on DWTS during its fourth season when, at 18, she became the show’s youngest winner. Older brother Derek joined her in season five, and has only missed two seasons since that time. Surely when they started out, neither could have imagined becoming more relevantly famous than many of the contestants that would come and go on DWTS over the years. Nor could they have imagined building a dance empire that would be able to sell out concert venues and produce one of the most awkward Lip Sync Battle showdowns in the competition’s brief history. And if the rumors are true, we could soon see Julianne Hough judging Ryan Lochte’s dancing prowess while her brother tries to play the role of Michael Phelps and spoil the swimmer’s chance at another gold medal (in the form of a mirror-ball trophy). Derek does, after all, have the same number of DWTS titles as Lochte does Olympic gold medals (six), and the aqua-man will be squarely on that hardwood Hough home turf. This could get messy.

The Houghs Will Triumphantly Return to DWTS