Worst Dancing With The Stars Wardrobe Malfunctions Ever

Dancing with the Stars has endured because people apparently love to watch celebs try to dance professionally on television, but an undeniably large part of those performances are the cast's inventive (and often super revealing) outfits. There's been some truly memorable costumes over the years, some of which went down in history for all the wrong reasons — yep, we're talking wardrobe malfunctions, a.k.a. the show's costume designers' worst nightmare.

"I cannot watch the live show without thinking about the costumes," designer Daniela Gschwendtner told TV Insider. "All I look at is their boobs and booties. I need to watch the show a second time to really watch the show, after I know everything is fine." It's not just the female performers that the costume designers get nervous about. "For the boys, we build even the suits and the shirts," fellow wardrobe guru Steven Lee said. "The arms have to have movement, the shirts not come un-tucked when they dance and the shoulders can't rise on the jackets, so there's no malfunction."

They do their best, but the fact that Gschwendtner and Lee have to oversee the making of every costume every single week means there's no time for test runs. Sometimes a loose shoe or slack strap will go unnoticed, and sometimes those seemingly minor oversights cause major embarrassment. Let's take a look at the worst Dancing with the Stars wardrobe malfunctions ever.

Actor and musician John Schneider didn't have the best time on season 27 of Dancing with the Stars. He and professional partner Emma Slater scored a dismal 18 out of 30 for their foxtrot, and their team tango was another low-point. The pair joined forces with NSYNC's Joey Fatone for the routine, which was almost derailed when Slater's hair got caught in the buttons of Schneider's costume.

"I gotta ask before we go to the judges, did Emma get caught on your vest there?" Judge Tom Bergeron said after the hit-and-miss Argentine tango concluded. "Yeah, she pulled her hair out," Schneider said (via Pop Culture). The country music star revealed that Slater had instructed him to "just keep going" in the event of a mishap. "As soon as her hair got caught in there, she went rip and she looked at me like, 'Let's dance,'" Schneider said backstage.

"I thought I wouldn't have any hair left, but it didn't bother me," Slater said, confirming her warrior status. "I just want these guys to have the best night and just show them the love they've shared [with] me all week." Alas, Slater's selfless move wasn't enough to impress the judges. Yep, poor Slater suffered hair loss for an underwhelming 21 points.

Former Dallas Cowboys cheerleader Melissa Rycroft became a reality star vying for the affection of Jason Mesnick in Season 13 of The Bachelor, but when she took to the DWTS ballroom floor with partner Tony Dovolani, they quickly becoming one of Season 8's standout couples, finishing third on DWTS that season. The duo returned in 2015 to win the All-Star season.

The pair danced some memorable dances during their two stints together, and they wore some rather memorable outfits, too. Rycroft certainly looked the part in the sparkly number she wore when she and Dovolani performed one of their sambas together, but the support that costume offered was far from ample. "My boob came out!" Rycroft can be heard telling her partner at the end of their routine. Nobody seemed to care, because the audience was in raptures and the judges were raving, dishing out perfect tens to the team.

Kimberly "Lil' Kim" Jones and her professional partner, Derek Hough, established an on-point chemistry during Season 8 of Dancing with the Stars, but that didn't make them immune to wardrobe malfunctions. The rap star and occasional actress was jiving so hard with Hough (who was super nervous about working with Lil' Kim because of her bad-girl rep) that her "girls" almost popped right out of her top. Host Tom Bergeron had to step in front of her as she adjusted her outfit, but Lil' Kim seemed more interested in the judges than her wardrobe malfunction. Clearly, they didn't care about her ill-fitting outfit either because the dancing duo scored 28 out of 30 possible points — the best score of the night.

After the show, Lil' Kim told KABC-TV that it wasn't her first wardrobe malfunction of this nature. "I don't know why this happens a lot of the time, but ... the girls were trying to come out," she said. Luckily for her, not everybody at home saw what happened. The moment was "edited out by the time the show was rebroadcast on the West Coast," reported the Washington Examiner.

Vegas-born dancer Chelsie Hightower first appeared as part of the Dancing with the Stars professional roster in Season 8 and stayed on the show through Season 15. In her penultimate season, she was teamed with Roshon Fegan, an actor who would later go on to play the abusive boyfriend of Zora Greenleaf in OWN's Greenleaf. The pair went for it hard on Latin Night that year — almost too hard in Hightower's case. She was on the verge of exposing herself as she went into a chest-pop — something Judge Tom Bergeron noticed.

After the routine ended, the show's host pulled up the strap on Hightower's top as she stumbled into her partner, exhausted. "I was hoping nobody saw that," Hightower told Entertainment Tonight after the show. "That's not the only time it's happened. That's like the third time." Fegan attributed the malfunction to Hightower's sheer tenacity. "I feel like she just danced her outfit off," he said. "It couldn't hang on ... Next time, we'll be smart about and we'll incorporate a move to pull [her top] back up."

Actor Frankie Muniz was named co-host of Dancing with the Stars: Juniors in 2018, more than a decade after he appeared on season 25 of the main show. He was partnered with Witney Carson, an Emmy-nominated choreographer who can dance everything from tap to hip-hop. But no amount of training can prevent a wardrobe malfunction, which happened during Carson and Muniz's Argentine tango on Disney Night. Near the end of their Pirates of the Caribbean-inspired routine, Carson's dress caught on her heel and she had to be dragged across the floor by the former Malcolm in the Middle star.

Muniz told People he was actually worried about the steps during that moment, having "messed up in that spot" during practice. "And then I felt her not be in the right spot and I thought, 'Did I mess up?'" he said. Carson praised her celebrity counterpart, commending him for sticking to the steps despite the mishap. "I literally couldn't step out of the skirt so I was spinning on one foot and luckily he kept going or I would have gone down for sure," she said. "Thank goodness he's a good partner." The pair earned 29 out of a possible 30 points — the second highest score of the evening.

We don't usually get to see the wardrobe malfunctions that take place on overseas versions of Dancing with the Stars, but when those malfunctions involve American celebs, they will inevitably make the news. "I'm Outta Love" singer Anastacia found this out the hard way. She appeared in the Dancer for a Night segment on the Italian version of the show, partnering with Maykel Fonts for a performance that would go down in wardrobe malfunction history. As London's Evening Standard put it, she "flashed her posterior and flesh coloured knickers to the nation." 

How did Italy end up getting a close-up view of Anastacia's underwear? The incident took place during a botched lift, as the multi-platinum selling artist struggled to wrap her legs around Fonts' neck. Both soldiered on with the routine, and after the show, she chose to simply ignore the mishap. Instead, Anastacia took to Instagram to thank Fonts for the "hard work and a fun exciting routine," making no mention of the booty brouhaha.