Julia Stiles’ DWTS Casting Has Fans Calling ‘Cheating’ Over a ‘Save the Last Dance’ Mix-Up

Julia Stiles joining Dancing With the Stars immediately sent fans back to 2001, with a wave of tongue-in-cheek “cheating” jokes confusing the actress with her dance-trained Save the Last Dance character.

Julia Stiles was officially revealed as Ezra Sosa’s celebrity partner for Dancing With the Stars Season 35, putting the actress back at the center of a dance-floor conversation 25 years after Save the Last Dance. The new season is set to begin with a two-night premiere on September 15 and 16 on ABC and Disney+.

After Sosa made the pairing TikTok official, commenters quickly leaned into one very specific joke: Stiles already had an unfair advantage because she had supposedly attended Juilliard. As Complex reported, fans joked that her fictional dance credentials should count as prior experience.

The gag comes straight from Save the Last Dance, where Stiles played Sara Johnson, an aspiring ballerina chasing a place at Juilliard. In real life, Stiles did take ballet when she was younger, but she did not attend Juilliard and has pushed back on the idea that the 2001 movie made her a professional dancer.

“I’m so grateful for all the opportunities that came from that movie but I am not a professional dancer,” Stiles told Us Weekly after the cast reveal. “I just played pretend.” Sosa made the distinction just as clear, joking that they were emphasizing she did not actually get into Juilliard because that storyline belonged to her character, not Stiles herself.

Stiles also said she stopped taking dance classes after Save the Last Dance because she became self-conscious about the expectations surrounding her performance. That makes her DWTS run less of a victory lap for an experienced dancer and more of a return to something she stepped away from for years, this time with Sosa guiding her through ballroom training.

The timing gives the pairing an extra dose of nostalgia, arriving during the 25th anniversary year of Save the Last Dance. Whether the Juilliard jokes continue or not, Julia Stiles’ DWTS debut now gives audiences a chance to see what she can do outside the movie role that still follows her onto the dance floor.