Whitney Leavitt’s Broadway Move Revealed After Dancing With the Stars

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Whitney Leavitt’s next career move isn’t a secret anymore.

After appearing on season 34 of Dancing With the Stars, reality TV star from Secret Lives of Mormon Wives will be making her first appearance on Broadway. She’s landed a highly sought-after role in the famous musical Chicago, starting next year.

She excitedly announced on Instagram on December 1st that she’ll be playing Roxie Hart in the Chicago musical, and can’t wait to perform in New York City!

The 32-year-old actor will begin performing in the show on February 2nd at the Ambassador Theatre, with the production running until March 15th.

This role is Whitney’s first time performing in a professional theater production, though she’s already a very experienced performer. While competing on Dancing with the Stars, she consistently impressed the judges, even earning a perfect score in week nine before being eliminated in the semi-finals.

Although the popular MomTok influencer didn’t win the Mirrorball trophy, she still found the experience very rewarding. She shares three children – Sedona, 6, Liam, 3, and Billy Gene, 13 months – with her husband, Conner Leavitt.

She shared in a November 20th Instagram video that the experience helped her build genuine friendships and strong connections with others. She also said it was a time of self-discovery, surrounded by supportive people who encouraged her to grow, leaving her feeling truly loved.

Whitney has talked about why she came back to the show. During the third season of SLOMW, she revealed she rejoined the Hulu series—even though her relationships with the other moms were still strained—because she wanted to compete in the ballroom dancing portion.

I did take a break from being on camera after last season, but I remained active within the MomTok community. I just needed some time off. However, when I found out Dancing With the Stars was considering someone from The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives, that made me want to return – I wanted to be part of that competition.

Curious about what it takes to put on a show like Dancing With the Stars? Read on for an inside look at how it’s made…

According to a 2019 report in Variety, Dancing With the Stars contestants initially earn around $125,000 for rehearsals and the first two weeks of the show. Contestants who advance further receive additional payments each week, potentially earning up to $295,000 total, sources said.

However, Bobby Bones said he made more than this when he won season 27 with Sharna Burgess in 2018.

I was listening to Jason Tartick’s podcast, Trading Secrets, from September 2025, and a guest was talking about their experience on a show. They said the pay started at nothing for the first episode, but then jumped to $10,000 for the second. It sounds like it quickly increased – around $10,000, then $10,000 again, then $20,000, and eventually $20,000 per episode. They mentioned that if you stick with it, you could end up making about $50,000 an episode!

In addition to a salary of about $110,000, Bones revealed he earned nearly $400,000 from the show.

ABC has not publicly confirmed any of these figures.

Details about professional dancers’ earnings haven’t been widely released either. However, similar to the contestants, it appears their pay increases the further they advance on the show.

But even if a pro is eliminated in the first round, they’re not leaving the ballroom empty-handed.

Jenna Johnson explained on the June 2025 episode of the The Morning After podcast, hosted by Kelly Stafford and Hank Winchester, that dancers are typically guaranteed work for a specific number of weeks. However, she added that contracts vary and she couldn’t comment on everyone’s situation.

Apparently not.

Professional dancers on Dancing with the Stars, like Cheryl Johnson—who has won with both Olympic skater Adam Rippon (season 26) and The Bachelor‘s Joey Graziadei (season 33)—don’t earn extra money for winning the show’s Mirrorball Trophy, now named after the late Len Goodman. However, she points out that reaching the finale still has its benefits, beyond just the prestige.

She explained on The Morning After that reaching the finale means you receive full season pay plus a bonus. However, winning isn’t about a large cash prize; it’s simply a shared trophy with your teammate.

That doesn’t appear to be the case.

In a 2022 appearance on Trading Secrets, Lindsay Arnold shared that her pay was reduced by more than half after she moved from being a professional dancer to a troupe member.

The pros get little input when it comes to being matched with a celebrity.

On the May 2025 episode of Maggie Sellers’ podcast, Hot Smart Rich, Lindsay explained that people in these situations have no input. She described it as simply being told, ‘Here’s your partner—now you need to make the relationship work.’

In fact, Jenna said the pairing is often a secret until the last minute.

Jenna explained on The Morning After that the show aims to keep the cast a complete surprise until the live reveal. People often assume the show knows who’s participating and deliberately keeps it under wraps, but that’s not true – the show doesn’t even tell the hosts who the contestants are! They prefer to keep the cast a secret to preserve the genuine reactions when partners meet for the first time, even though leaks sometimes happen. They really prioritize keeping everything under wraps until the big reveal.

As for what the Dancing With the Stars team looks for when making these matches?

According to former showrunner Rob Wade, the show’s pairings weren’t random. In a 2015 interview with TopMob News, he explained they considered height, body type, personality, and how well people would get along. They intentionally avoided matching people who were likely to clash, as the experience is already intense enough. Unlike shows like The Bachelor, forcing incompatible pairings would create a negative experience for everyone involved – the celebrity, the production team, and the audience. He admitted they’d learned from past mistakes where pairings simply didn’t work out.

Dancing With the Stars requires a huge time commitment. Rylee Arnold, who danced with Stephen Nedoroscik in season 33, explained on the Lightweights Podcast With Joe Vulpis that rehearsals are four hours long, happening either from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m., 1 p.m. to 5 p.m., or 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. The work doesn’t end there; she often meets with producers, works on choreography, or studies dance videos afterward. Rylee says her entire life revolves around the show, but she loves it and finds it fulfilling. It’s a demanding job with rehearsals happening almost every day. They perform on Tuesdays, then rehearse from Wednesday to Sunday, followed by camera blocking on Monday, before starting the cycle again with Tuesday’s show.

I’m so excited to share that a return is happening! Emma Slater and Britt Stewart let fans know in a recent Instagram video that we’ll be back, though it’s a project we’re building with the show’s producers. It’s a collaborative effort, and we can’t wait to show you what we’ve been working on!

If you think the quickstep dance is fast-paced, you should see how quickly the costume department works! Costume designer Daniela Gschwendtner explained to TV Insider that they collaborate with set, lighting, and dance teams to create a unique story for each dancer’s outfit. Then, they have just five days – sometimes only half a day per costume, before even adding rhinestones – to make everything. The department employs around 20 people, plus a separate tailor shop, making it a large operation.

Costume designer Steven Norman Lee added that dancers often don’t try on their costumes until just hours before the show. While they might re-use pants for male dancers, most costumes are made from scratch each week.

Gschwendtner also noted that while they’ll reuse items for group performances or promotional shoots, they avoid reusing costumes for the actual competition. The goal is to keep everything fresh and new each week to maintain visual interest for the audience.

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2025-12-01 19:17