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Julianne Hough had an eyebrow-raising reaction to her brother Derek Hough’s Dancing With the Stars commentary about intimate routines between siblings.
“Derek adding in ‘tell me about it’ after Carrie Ann gave Ezra and Daniella credit for doing an intimate dance when they said they feel like siblings HAD ME GIGGGGGGLING,” a fan wrote via Threads during the Tuesday, November 10, live episode.
Julianne, 38, reposted the comment to her Instagram Stories on Thursday, November 12, alongside an emoji of a woman shrugging her shoulders.
Paralympian Ezra Frech and his pro partner, Daniella Karagach, noted in a Tuesday rehearsal package that they felt awkward getting into character for their intimate Grammy Night Argentine tango since they behaved like siblings. Even so, the pair delivered a spell-binding number that had judge Carrie Inaba joking that Frech, 21, turned his “sister into [his] lover” for the dance.
“Sister to lover that’s awkward,” host Alfonso Ribeiro chimed in.
Derek, 41, who sits on the judging panel with Inaba, 58, added, “Tell me about it, that was weird.”
While Derek didn’t further explain his reaction, he and Julianne have a long history of performing together.
“Our first thing that we ever did on Dancing With the Stars was we were both on the live tour,” Julianne recalled on a September 2025 episode of the “Chicks in the Office” podcast. “Carrie Ann was the one [who] choreographed everything, and she got us to do a rumba together.”
She added at the time, “Our names in the program were ‘Derek and Julianne Hough,’ so everybody thought we were married and we were doing this rumba. When people found out we were brother-sister, I remember there was one venue … and we just heard, ‘That’s just wrong!’”
Julianne and Derek both joined DWTS in 2007 as pro dancers, eventually winning a combined total of eight mirrorball trophies. While Derek now judges the competition with Inaba and Bruno Tonioli, Julianne serves as Ribiero’s cohost in the ballroom.
“It’s really cool that we get to do similar things in our own way,” she added on the podcast of their current DWTS roles. “We’re definitely unique, [but] we’re cut from the same cloth, so there’s a lot of similar energy, but we’re very different.”
While Julianne and Derek have stepped off the dance floor, they occasionally reunite for special — and less romantic — performances.
“We should. That door is always open for us to get together and do something fun, especially on Dancing With the Stars and Ovation as well,” Derek told Us exclusively in August 2025, referring to their cofounded dance convention. “TBD.”
