Dancing On Ice star Ashley Banjo has been a mainstay on the judging panel since 2018. His telly breakthrough came, of course, when he won Britain’s Got Talent as part of dance troupe Diversity.
Amid several years of subsequent TV success on shows such as Got to Dance, Dance Dance Dance, and The Real Full Monty, Ashley returned to BGT in 2020 to fill in for Simon Cowell as a judge as he recovered from a bike accident.
And it was during this run – just a few months following the murder of George Floyd by a police officer in the US – that Diversity performed their stunning BLM-inspired routine.
Diversity’s BLM performance on BGT
While many viewers applauded the powerful moment on ITV, thousands of others made complaints to Ofcom.
Ashley also came in for a deluge of abuse on social media – but he maintained a dignified stance.
He wrote on Twitter at the time: “So much to say… But I’ll just let the performance talk. Thousands of messages of love and support – thank you.
“For the thousands of messages of hate and ignorance – thank you. You highlight exactly what needs to change. Sending nothing but love to you all.”
Ofcom, meanwhile, ruled there were no grounds for an investigation into the dance.
‘I hadn’t left the house for weeks’
Despite this, Ashley endured significant disruption to his life. A year on, in October 2021, he revealed on This Morning that he didn’t leave his home for weeks due to the backlash.
He explained at the time: “There was a moment where I hadn’t left the house for weeks. When I went out for the first time I was looking at people thinking – what do they think?
“At one point, I was getting tweeted 100 tweets a minute. It was 60% negative. We’re talking of thousands of messages. Where are these people in the tangible physical world? In the street, all I got was life.”
Around the same time, Ashley also denied he was attempting to “make a political statement”.
He told The Guardian: “I wasn’t trying to cause reform or change policy, I was just bringing the conversation to a place that is natural for me: a stage.”
Read more: Dancing On Ice judge Ashley Banjo left ‘really scared’ after finding worrying lump
Dancing On Ice is on ITV1, Sunday March 2, at at 6.30pm.
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