Maura Higgins has been officially partnered with Mark Ballas for the 35th season of Dancing With The Stars.
The 35 year old television personality, who rose to fame on Love Island in the United Kingdom and was recently named as the host of the Blind Date reboot, shared the announcement on her Instagram page. Mark is the son of Shirley Ballas, who is known to audiences as head judge on the British dance competition Strictly Come Dancing. Dancing With The Stars is the American spin off of the Strictly format.
She posted a photograph of herself posing alongside Mark in a bedazzled pink leotard. She captioned the image: "TEAM TINK" followed by a four leaf clover emoji.
The pair are already well acquainted, having appeared together on the United States version of Celebrity Traitors earlier this year.
Fellow Love Island alumni Amber Davies and Tasha Ghouri, who both appeared with Higgins on the ITV2 reality show, left congratulatory messages in the comments section underneath her post.
Season 35 celebrity cast list
The full Dancing With The Stars lineup features 16 celebrities competing in the ballroom.
Actress Julia Stiles will dance with Ezra Sosa, while dancer Jenna Dewan is paired with Val Chmerkovskiy. Tatyana Ali will compete alongside Jan Ravnik, and musician Taylor Hanson will partner with Britt Stewart.
Paralympian Ezra Frech will dance with Daniella Karagach, and Amber Glenn is paired with Pasha Pashkov. Connor Wood will compete with Rylee Arnold, while Sarah Jane Nader dances with Hailey Bills.
Tyler Cameron will be partnered with Sharna Burgess, and Giada De Laurentiis will take on the competition with Alan Bersten. Harry Shum Jr. is paired with Jenna Johnson, and Conner Leavitt will dance with Adele Zaikman.
Comedian Guillermo Rodriguez will compete with Witney Carson, Ciara Miller will dance with Brandon Armstrong, and Jackson Olson rounds out the cast alongside Emma Slater.
Night out with Bruno Tonioli
Ahead of the cast announcement on Good Morning America on Wednesday, Higgins enjoyed a night out with Dancing With The Stars judge Bruno Tonioli.
The reality star linked arms with Bruno as they headed to dinner on Tuesday evening. She wore a black leather dress and knee high boots, with her brunette hair slicked back and wearing sunglasses. She waved as she left the dinner.
The Irish star previously arrived for her first day of rehearsals at a Los Angeles dance studio last month, beaming and waving at gathered fans.
Gleb Savchenko dispute
Higgins, who shot to fame in the United States earlier this year with her appearance on The Traitors, had already generated controversy before the cast reveal by stating she did not want to be paired with professional dancer Gleb Savchenko. She had hoped to partner with Valentin Chmerkovskiy, whom she previously danced with for a promotional video.
She told E! News she was remaining fiercely loyal to her close friend Brooks Nader, a former Dancing With The Stars contestant who dated Gleb.
"I'd be happy with anyone but Gleb. That's only because I'm loyal and I'm friends with Brooks," Higgins told the outlet. "I don't really like the way he speaks about women. I don't really want to spend all my time with someone like that. I'm like, no thank you."
Gleb responded to the comments in a statement given to the Daily Mail, saying he had never heard of her.
"Until I was asked to comment on this story, I'd genuinely never heard of this girl, Maura, so I'm certainly not going to lose any sleep over the opinions of someone I've never met," Gleb said.
"It's odd to publicly attack someone you've never even met, but if that's how she wants to make headlines before the show starts, that's her choice," he continued. "I'll stay focused and leave the unnecessary drama to everyone else."
Brooks Nader relationship
Higgins' comments followed public statements Gleb made about his ex girlfriend Brooks, calling their relationship the worst sex he has ever had.
Gleb and Brooks began a romance in the fall of 2024 when they were partnered together on Dancing With The Stars.
The ballroom dancer recently spoke about the Louisiana born beauty to Dakota Mortensen, the ex boyfriend of reality television star Taylor Frankie Paul.
"When I dated her, it was pretty bad. Probably the worst sex of my life," Gleb claimed, adding that she often took things to a rough level that made him uncomfortable.
The former couple endured a messy split. Brooks intimated they had parted ways in a TikTok video posted in October 2024.
"Gleb got way too comfortable, especially in the amount of time he was spending at Brooks' home, to a point it had begun to concern Brooks' people and family close to her," an insider told US Weekly in the fall of 2024.
The pair appeared to reconcile the following month when Brooks welcomed Gleb to her family's Thanksgiving dinner. They parted ways again in April last year, with Gleb telling Page Six he was caught off guard by the breakup.
