Actress Amanda Abbington has reached a five-figure settlement with the BBC over the bullying allegations she made about her time on Strictly Come Dancing, closing the legal chapter of a scandal that reshaped how the show treats its contestants.
Abbington competed in the 2023 series partnered with professional dancer Giovanni Pernice. She withdrew after several weeks, initially for medical and personal reasons, and later alleged that Pernice had bullied and harassed her during rehearsals, describing verbal abuse and a working day that left her distressed.
The BBC reviewed her complaints in 2024 and upheld some but not all of them. It upheld complaints of verbal bullying and harassment, while making no findings of physical aggression, and it apologised to Abbington for her experience. Pernice rejected any claim of threatening or abusive behaviour and welcomed the end of the review; he was not part of the Strictly professional line-up the following year and went on to win the Italian version of the format.
The settlement, understood to be a five-figure sum paid by BBC Studios rather than from the licence fee, followed Abbington's indication in 2024 that she had not ruled out legal action. Friends quoted in reports said she was relieved the ordeal was over and hoped the case would encourage others to speak up.
The dispute has flared again with the publication of Pernice's memoir, in which he gives his account of the partnership and describes the toll the allegations took on him. Abbington responded that he was mischaracterising what happened to suit his own narrative, pointing to the BBC findings and the compensation she received, and said her focus was on moving forward. Fellow contestant Angela Rippon has also recalled that others in the 2023 cast were aware of tension between the pair behind the scenes.
Strictly has changed because of the affair. The BBC introduced chaperones to be present during training-room rehearsals and strengthened welfare measures around the programme, an acknowledgement that the rehearsal room culture needed closer supervision.
What began as a celebrity's early exit from a dance show became a test of how Britain's biggest entertainment programme handles complaints against its own stars. The settlement ends Abbington's claim, but the competing accounts — hers, his, and the BBC's partial findings — ensure the Strictly scandal will be argued over for some time.
Fellow professionals have been drawn into the argument too. Angela Rippon, who competed in the same series, said cast members could hardly miss the distress behind the scenes, even if the detail was not theirs to discuss publicly. Her intervention matters because it came from inside the process rather than from either camp. It supports the picture painted by the BBC's own changes: whatever the rights and wrongs of individual conduct, the old expectation that celebrities should simply endure a punishing rehearsal culture is finished, and Strictly's producers now work under a visibly different regime.