The actress shared the response she received after opening up about her experience on the BBC show
Amanda Abbington opened up about the "death threats" she received after the fallout from the Strictly Come Dancing incident with Giovanni Pernice reached the public sphere.
Best known for her role in Sherlock, the actress participated in the 2023 series of Strictly Come Dancing and was partnered with professional dancer Giovanni Pernice at the time.
She then left the show after claims of "vile abuse" were made against Giovanni, leading to an investigation behind the scenes. After it was completed, Giovanni was cleared of the most serious accusations made against him and the broadcaster issued a formal apology to Amanda.
They upheld six of the 17 complaints, which related to verbal bullying and harassment instead of the more serious allegations on the physical side.
Speaking on Kate Thornton’s podcast, White Wine Question Time, Amanda reflected: "It’s been a year now and I don’t wish anyone ill will. I just didn’t like how I was treated. There was never a witch hunt, I never wanted to tear anybody down, I just felt I wasn't being treated fairly in that room.
"I knew that several other women before me hadn't been treated fairly in that room and I didn’t want that to happen to somebody like my daughter.
"I never wanted to take down Strictly, I just wanted to highlight that sometimes bad behaviour manifests itself in very different ways, and what is acceptable for one person isn't acceptable for another."
She continued: "Journalists were literally writing lies about what I was saying and what they thought had happened, and they had a lot to do with why I left social media because I was getting 20 death threats a day all because someone decided to go 'I don’t like what’s happening here, can we do something about it?'"
As for Giovanni, the dancer has not returned to the BBC ballroom, and instead has starred in other shows including Celebrity Hunted and this summer he is going on tour with Strictly legend, Anton Du Beke.
Since Strictly, Giovanni was named winner of the Italian dance show Ballando Con Le Stelle. He won the 19th season of the show with his professional partner and real-life partner Bianca Guaccero.
While on the podcast, Amanda also shared what it was like working on set with Martin Freeman after they privately separated. She admitted: "The people on the show didn’t know. The media didn’t know for nine months that we’d separated, it just so happened that Martin mentioned it in a comment about nine months after we split up."And by that time the kids had got used to it. Everyone, all our family and friends had got used to it and so it didn't mean anything. It lost its meaning."
