Dancing with the Stars' return is less than two months away.
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ABC has announced the seventeenth edition of Dancing with the Stars will premiere Monday, September 16 at 8PM ET/PT.
Recent reports have claimed the reality dancing competition may experience a shakeup in its judging panel and lose some of its pros.
"No one has a confirmed contract yet," a show source told The New York Post in late May.
"I think [Bruno Tonioli] will be back, but [Carrie Ann Inaba] and [Len Goodman] are probably gone. The network has been very evasive about it."
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Tonioli, Inaba and Goodman have been serving as Dancing with the Stars' judges since its first season debuted back in 2005.
Several professional dancers, who are fan favorites, may also be absent from the show's lineup next season.
According to The Post sources, four-time Dancing with the Stars champion Derek Hough will be skipping the season to work on a new scripted series he and his sister, fellow former Dancing with the Stars pro Julianne Hough, are developing for the Starz cable network. According to prior reports, the series, dubbed Blackpool, will focus on the "darker" side of the world of competitive ballroom dancing.
Fellow pro Mark Ballas is also in negotiations to star in his own reality series, according to The Post. While the newspaper reported Cheryl Burke is also unlikely to return to the show, she told Parade magazine in late May that as long as Dancing with the Stars wants to have her, she'll be there.
A change that has been confirmed for next season, however, is the show's format. ABC announced in early May this fall's edition of Dancing with the Stars will not feature a results show and each week's elimination results will be folded into the ballroom dancing competition's two-hour Monday night broadcasts.
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Dancing with the Stars' eighteenth season is also expected to feature the same once-a-week broadcast format when it airs in early 2014.
About The Author: Elizabeth Kwiatkowski