Dancing With The Stars pro suspended for a week after joking about "Fresh Prince"-ing one of his co-workers

The allusion to Will Smith’s infamous behavior at the 2022 Oscars was crystal clear—even if Chmerkovskiy has claimed that he wasn’t thinking about that part of Smith’s performance when he posted the video. Specifically, the dancer posted an apology to his Instagram Story on Saturday, suggesting that when he made the initial post his mind was on the bit from the incident where Smith yelled at Rock to keep his wife’s name out of his fucking mouth, and not, say, the part—which might, we feel moved to note, be the single most famous moment in modern Oscars history—when Smith stormed the stage and attempted to physically remove said name from Rock’s mouth through the application of an open-handed slap. 

“In a moment where my instinct was to defend my wife,” Chmerkovskiy wrote, “I made a poor decision to reference a meme to ‘keep my wife’s name’ out of the conversation, without stopping to think through what else that reference could imply, which was genuinely not my intention.” Chmerkovskiy went on to apologize to Inaba, as well as his current celebrity dance partner, Jenna Dewan, who’ll be dancing with pro Alan Bernsten in next week’s episode of the long-running series.

In its statement on the suspension, BBC Studios wrote that, “The well-being of everyone who works on Dancing With The Stars is non-negotiable. Val’s social media post was inappropriate and does not reflect the values or standards expected of anyone connected with the show. As a result, he will not participate in next week’s show.”