According to reports, ABC is unwilling to watch gay male duos dance together on their long-running and improbably popular show Dancing with the Stars.
Ariana Grande, Meghan Trainor, and gay singer Who Is Fancy are scheduled to perform the song “Boys Like You” on the program’s November 23rd episode.
The song’s lyrics spin a yarn about a young man who falls in love with another fellow.
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So the choreographer wasn’t exactly going out on a sexy limb by envisioning two men dancing with one another during the act.
While there are no doubt two or three gay men actively involved in the dance community as a whole, TMZ reports that ABC squashed the choreographer’s plans, evidently thinking two men cutting a rug would be too hot to handle for prime-time audiences.
The reports claim ABC doesn’t want to see two men “near dancing” with each other — certainly not while a song about two men falling in love is pulsing in the background.
One producer’s dismissive email stated: “Apologies all, but this is a definitive no from the network.”
It’s a bit of a head-scratcher, considering the network featured some conspicuously “near dancing” between dancers Alek Skarlatos and Carlos PenaVega on their November 9th show — who were dancing to “We Will Rock You” by Queen, no less.
Neither ABC or Dancing with the Stars have definitively commented on the issue.
h/t: Business Insider