In 2019, there was an accident during Dancing with the Stars rehearsals.
Former model, Christie Brinkley, fell during practice and broke her arm. She had to pull out of the show, but DWTS allowed her daughter to replace her.
While several fans falsely claimed that Christie faked her injury to get her daughter on the show, they were far from right. In fact, the injury still affects Brinkley three years later.
Christie Brinkley’s DWTS accident still causing problems
Christie Brinkley has talked various times since the accident about her injury.
The accident happened when Christie was practicing with Val Chmerkovskiy. They planned to dance to the Billy Joel song Uptown Girl, which was ironic since the singer actually wrote that song when he was dating Christie but before the two got married.
Christie tripped over Val’s heel and tried to break her fall with her arm.
Most recently, she spoke to HELLO! Magazine about the fact that she still struggles with the broken arm’s lingering effects.
“When I broke my arm I also did something to my shoulder which has not recovered,” Christie told HELLO!. “I have done a round of MRIs and they told me I need a complete shoulder replacement.”
However, the former model, now 68, said that she is too busy to have surgery on her shoulder. Instead, she said that she plans to look at various alternatives like stem cell treatments to see how that goes for now.
Christie said that she broke her arm and required a metal plate and screws to “hold my arm together.”
“Im so sorry if I’ve disappointed anybody! Only something as bad as this could stop me from continuing to dance with my wonderful coach for @dancingabc,” she wrote on Instagram at the time of her injury.
Christie Brinkley responds to claims she faked her injury for daughter Sailor
Her daughter Sailor took her mom’s place, but Christie said that she was “terrified” to dance in the ballroom. Sailor made it to Week 6 of that season.
This led to Wendy Williams claiming that Christie Brinkley faked her injury, which itself led to her appearing on The Talk, alongside DWTS judge, Carrie Ann Inaba. She said to Wendy in the episode that it is “so much more fun to be kind.”
Dancing with the Stars is on hiatus. The dancing reality competition series will return in late 2022 to its new home on Disney+ streaming.