Mark Cuban, the HDTV Pioneer and Dallas Mavericks owner, will be putting on his dancing shoes as a contestant in this season’s Dancing with the Stars, the ABC mega-hit, network officials said Wednesday.
Outspoken Cuban, founder of HDNet and an Internet-broadcasting pioneer, is one of a dozen celebrities that will be competing in the ballroom-dance competition, which kicks off its fifth season Sept. 24.
The announcement of the cast, the show’s largest ever, was made Wednesday morning on ABC’s Good Morning America.
In its press release, ABC described Cuban as “the highly successful entrepreneur who founded HDNet, Broadcast.com and MicroSolutions. Cuban went on to sell Broadcast.com and Micro Solutions to Yahoo! and CompuServe, respectively. He is partnered with Kym Johnson, who returns for her third season.”
Some of the other Dancing with the Stars contestants this season are are: Melanie Brown, also known as “Scary Spice”; Sabrina Bryan, a member of Disney Channel’s The Cheetah Girls; Indianapolis 500 champion Helio Castroneves; Beverly Hills: 90201 alum Jennie Garth; boxing champ Floyd Mayweather; Wayne Newton; Marie Osmond; and actress Jane Seymour.
As an added twist, viewers get a chance to size up the male vs. the female stars, as each gender hits the dance floor on separate nights during the first week of competition.
Cuban will be glad to know that Dancing with the Stars is broadcast in 720 Progressive [720P], ABC’s selected HDTV format.
