Dancing With the Stars has officially found its new, well, star.
The ABC reality competition series’ search for a fresh season 35 cast member came to an end during DWTS: The Next Pro‘s season one finale Aug. 31 as finalists Selena Hamilton, AJ Pritchard and Adele Zaikman found out their fates.
When it came time for host—and season 34 champion—Robert Irwin to announce which hopeful was crowned the winner by judges Mark Ballas and Shirley Ballas, it was Adele whose fancy footwork earned her a spot on the forthcoming season of the flagship series.
“I just feel like this is a celebration of all the sacrifices that I’ve done,” Adele, a Blackpool Dance Festival champion, said following her win. “It’s just like a big ‘I made it’ moment.”
For his part, AJ was the runner-up, while Selena came in third place.
Earlier in the finale, guest judge Derek Hough was in awe at Adele’s skill.
“Adele, you could just walk across the floor and you would be captivating,” he said. “If you became a pro, you wouldn’t just fit in; you would elevate the rest of the Dancing with the Stars cast. I really believe that.”
Adele will now join the season 35 cast of Dancing With the Stars, and her celebrity partner will be revealed Sept. 2, along with the rest of the cast.
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Dancing With the Stars: The Next Pro: Meet the Cast
Heading into the Next Pro finale, it was anyone’s game following a season of show-stopping stunts, killer choreography and unforgettable performances.
After nine emotional eliminations, only AJ, Adele, Selena and Allen Genkin remained. But after giving it his all during a jive performance with Witney Carson, Allen was sent home on Aug. 24 just one week prior to the finale episode.
And while Allen won’t be salsa-ing with a celebrity partner when season 35 premieres next month, he’ll forever treasure the advice he received throughout the experience, not to mention the lifelong friendships he formed.
“I’m feeling really grateful and blessed to be a part of Dancing with the Stars,” Allen said in an Instagram video posted Aug. 25. “I’m going to take this opportunity to grow as a choreographer, to grow as a dancer, to grow as a leader, to grow as a person. That’s the whole beauty of it all.”
The So You Think You Can Dance? alum also shouted out his fellow season one contestants, noting “we’ve become a big family.”
Allen concluded, “This is not the last you guys have seen me, for sure.”
Don’t miss the Dancing With the Stars season 35 premiere Tuesday, Sept. 15, at 8 p.m. on ABC.
In the meantime, keep reading for surprising BTS secrets about the making of the show.
ABC/Paula Lobo
However, Bobby Bones said he made more than this when he won season 27 with Sharna Burgess in 2018.
“That show pays OK,” the radio personality said on a Sept. 2025 episode of Jason Tartick’s podcast Trading Secrets. “Like, first episode, no money. Second episode, $10,000. I think it’s like, $10,000, $10,000, $20,000, $20,000. It ends up being $50,000 an episode if you last.”
Also receiving a base salary of around $110,000, Bones continued, “I ended up making close to $400,000 from that show.”
ABC has not publicly confirmed any of these figures.
But even if a pro is eliminated in the first round, they’re not leaving the ballroom empty-handed.
“You’re guaranteed until a certain amount of weeks,” Jenna Johnson said on a June 2025 episode of Kelly Stafford and Hank Winchester’s podcast The Morning After. “I think there’s different contracts though. I can’t speak for everybody.”
While Johnson—who won season 26 with Olympic figure skater Adam Rippon, as well as season 33 with The Bachelor’s Joey Graziadei—says the pros don’t get a larger paycheck if they take home what is now called the Len Goodman Mirrorball Trophy, she noted there’s still an incentive to make it to the finale (besides bragging rights, of course).
“If you make it all the way to the end, you’re getting paid the whole season, which is amazing, and you get a bonus on top of that for making it to the finale,” she explained on The Morning After. “If you win, it’s not like you win a $1 million and split it with your partner. You’re just getting a cute trophy together.”
On a 2022 episode of Trading Secrets, Lindsay Arnold recalled how her salary was cut “more than in half” when she was demoted from pro to troupe member.
“You get no say,” Lindsay said on a May 2025 episode of Maggie Sellers’ Hot Smart Rich podcast. “It’s very much just, ‘Here’s your partner. Make it work.'”
In fact, Jenna said the pairing is often a secret until the last minute.
“They really want to keep it a secret until you meet them live,” Jenna said on The Morning After. “They want that genuine reaction. So I think people always think we know who we have and we’re keeping it a secret. Absolutely not. They do not tell us. They really don’t even want us to know the cast. It gets leaked a lot, but they want it very hush-hush until you walk in and meet your partner.”
As for what the Dancing With the Stars team looks for when making these matches?
“It’s based on height, build and personality and compatibility,” former showrunner Rob Wade told E! News in 2015. “We don’t pair people who aren’t going to get on. It’s too intense. It’s not like The Bachelor or something, we couldn’t do that. That would just be miserable experience for the celebrity, for us and the viewer. You don’t want to see two people who don’t like each other and, quite frankly, we have made that mistake pairing people up who didn’t get on so well.”
