Dancing with no expense spared...
Cash-strapped RTÉ keeps big budget for ratings puller
DESPITE implementing swingeing budget cuts across the national broadcaster, RTÉ is sparing no expense for this year’s production of Dancing With The Stars.
The revelation comes after RTÉ recently announced that a minimum of €10m in spending cuts are planned for next year.
These include reducing Fair City episodes from four nights a week to three, along with cuts to other programmes and to news and sport productions.
However, sources this weekend confirmed the station’s shiny flagship autumn entertainment show will operate on the same budget as in previous years.
There had been fears DWTS – which returns to our screens next month – would fall victim to cuts ordered by director general Kevin Bakhurst as part of his reforms to salvage the crisishit station.
However, an RTÉ source told the Irish Mail on Sunday: ‘Dancing [With The Stars] is a franchise, so there are certain criteria regarding production, staging and other standards that have to be adhered to.’
Despite the huge production costs involved in staging the show, Dancing With The Stars is one of the broadcaster’s highest-earning programmes.
Station sources said axing the show would have been seen as a ‘false economy’, and could have cost the station millions in lost advertising revenue.
The last series attracted an average of 525,000 viewers (including RTÉ+1), and enjoyed a 42% audience share, along with a further 17,200 streams on the RTÉ Player. And station bosses are conscious that any moves to create a slimmed-down show could backfire on the finances of the cashstrapped broadcaster.
A source told the MoS: ‘It will be more or less the same as previous years.
‘DWTS brought in great ratings for RTÉ last year, and there is no reason to believe that it won’t attract the same viewing numbers or even more this year.
‘So it doesn’t make sense to cut the budget and stage a slimmed-down show.’
It was widely believed the last season of DWTS – which saw RTÉ radio presenter Carl Mullan and his professional partner Emily Barker lift the coveted Glitterball – would be the last.
Even members of the judging panel believed the final curtain had fallen on the show.
Loraine Barry, who has been on the panel since the show’s inception, was convinced she had judged her final dance.
She told the MoS: ‘When the season ended we all thought that was it, that Dancing With The Stars was finished.
‘We weren’t told officially it was, just that it was being put out there and that’s what we were hearing and reading. So while we weren’t told officially that it was to be cancelled, we also weren’t told otherwise.’
Ms Barry said she was overjoyed when she received a call in September confirming DWTS would be back for another year.
‘I was delighted and totally thrilled,’ she said.
‘You’re always nervous when you see the call coming in or your phone. Will it be back, won’t it be back? Will they ask me back? Or are they calling to say they don’t want me back?
‘So I was just thrilled when I got the call to say it was coming back and they wanted me back on the judging panel,’ Ms Barry added.