Katya Jones and Wynne Evans looked tense as they walked to Strictly Come Dancing training on Tuesday.
The dance partners have spent the week defending their awkward exchange during Saturday night’s live show, when viewers spotted the toe-curling moment Katya moved Wynne’s hand away from her waist and snubbed his attempt at a high-five with her.
The opera singer, 52, and his pro dance partner, 35, have been hard at work this week, in between defending the interraction, but they looked far from their usual bubbly selves on Tuesday.
Showing the strain on their faces, neither Katya or Wynne raised a smile as they walked to their training studio in Wales.
Katya Jones and Wynne Evans looked tense as they walked to Strictly Come Dancing training studio in Wales on Tuesday
The dance partners have spent the week defending their awkward exchange during Saturday’s live show, when viewers spotted the moment Katya moved Wynne’s hand away from her waist
The appearance comes hours after the pair made an emotional appearance on Strictly spin off show It Takes Two.
Katya has defended her celebrity partner, declaring he has been ‘portrayed as someone he is not’, as the pair insist his ‘wandering hand’ incident was a silly joke.
On Monday evening’s TV appearance, Wynne admitted he had watched the footage of the incident back and confessed: ‘I can see how people may have misinterpreted it.’
Clinging to his arm, Katya said she ‘can’t bear’ the flack her co-star is getting and was empathetic that there was no wrongdoing.
She said: ‘The idea that it made me feel uncomfortable or offended in any way is total nonsense, and those that have doubts, you guys have got it wrong. So hopefully this will be the end of it, and you just keep making me smile.’
She added: ‘I can’t sit here watching this man being portrayed as someone he’s not. In fact, it couldn’t be further away from the truth.
‘So I have to make this absolutely clear that this whole incident, with the hand and the high five on Saturday night, was an inside joke between Wynne and I. Was it a silly joke? Yes, was it a bad joke? Yes.’
The incident caused such concern among BBC top brass, who have spent months firefighting accusations of misconduct on previous series, that a welfare investigation was conducted.
The opera singer and his pro dance partner have been hard at work this week, in between defending the interraction (pictured on Saturday)
They looked far from their usual bubbly selves on Tuesday as the walked to a dance studio
A source said: ‘The Strictly welfare team checked in on the pair individually to confirm that nothing was awry and that both were comfortable continuing with the partnership.
‘Training room researchers have kept meticulous logs of what goes on during rehearsals between every celebrity couple, and Wynne and Katya are no different.’
‘If there had been any form of misbehaviour or cause for concern, then it would have been flagged by the welfare team.
‘There hasn’t been and they consider the matter closed.’
The BBC confirmed that no further actions are planned.
Wynne, who has starred in the GoCompare adverts for over a decade, claims that he has been left ‘heartbroken’ by the fallout after some Strictly fans called for him to be axed from the show.
Showing the strain on their faces, neither Katya or Wynne raised a smile
Speaking on BBC Radio Wales, where he presents a daily show, Mr Evans said: ‘I’m absolutely heartbroken by the things that have been written about me in the last day.
He said: ‘I’m absolutely heartbroken by the things that have been written about me in the last day.
The duo had become surprise favourites to win this year’s Strictly, scoring 34 out of 40 from the judges for their tango on Saturday.
‘It’s not nice to live in that time, but basically Katya and I are really, really close and we’re really good friends, and on Saturday night we made a stupid joke.
‘It was a stupid joke that went wrong, okay, we thought it was funny. It wasn’t funny. It has been totally misinterpreted.
‘Everything’s on Katya’s socials. She’s talked about it. She’s explained that it was a joke. She wasn’t offended in the least. She doesn’t feel uncomfortable.
The appearance comes hours after the pair made an emotional appearance on Strictly spin off show It Takes Two
‘We’ve got a brilliant friendship, an absolutely tight friendship, and I’m sorry if anybody was offended by it, but it was a joke and yeah, that’s all there is, there is no real story, really.
‘And I feel weird apologising because I feel like I’ve not really done anything.’
He agreed he had ‘misjudged it’, when interviewed on Radio Wales Breakfast before starting his own show on the station, and confirmed he was ‘absolutely still up for’ Strictly.
He said: ‘I’m having the best time of my life. I just don’t want this to be the bit that people remember.’
On Sunday, Evans and Jones released a video on Instagram saying they were ‘just messing around in the ‘Clauditorium’ the previous evening and just want to say sorry. It was a silly joke’.
And replying to several users on X, formerly Twitter, the dancer said: ‘You picked up on our joke!’
As the dancing duo gave the downlow about any secret romances going on behind the scenes in a recent interview, Wynne randomly steered the question onto Katya
In another moment on Saturday night, Jones appeared to not want to high five her celebrity partner.
A caption alongside their video explained that ‘high fives is a running joke’.
But viewers of Sunday night’s results show were not convinced by the explanation, claiming they had spotted Jones appearing to ‘glare’ at her celebrity partner.
During the show, Claudia asked Evans how he felt, noting he looked shocked.
Wynne replied: ‘I am shocked because I didn’t think I’d survive week one so to be here after having done a tango is really thrilling.
‘And I had such a good time and thank you to Katya’s clever choreography.’
As Evans gave his answer fans spotted that Katya remained stony faced and even appeared to wince as the opera singer evaluated his performance.
The duo had become surprise favourites to win this year’s Strictly, scoring 34 out of 40 from the judges for their tango on Saturday
Chaperones have been put in place on Strictly during rehearsals for this year after an review was launched by the BBC following Sherlock actress Amanda Abbington making complaints about her 2023 professional dance partner, Giovanni Pernice.
The BBC apologised to Abbington and said: ‘We have assessed the complaints and we have upheld some, but not all, of the complaints made.’
Pernice has always denied the allegations, and said he was ‘happy’ after the investigation cleared him of the majority of abuse allegations.
Outlining the show’s new duty of care measures in September, the BBC said: ‘In July, we introduced new measures for training and rehearsals, which are in place for this year’s show.
‘These included a production team member present during training room rehearsals at all times; two new roles on the show dedicated to welfare support – a celebrity welfare producer and a professional dancer welfare producer (both started work in August); and additional training for the professional dancers, production team and crew’.