Brooke Burke Recalls ‘Intimate Experience’ on DWTS as She Clarifies Derek Hough Affair Comments (Exclusive)

Brooke Burke sets the record straight about what happened between her and Derek Hough during their win Dancing with the stars partnership.

In PEOPLE’s exclusive episode from Monday Tamron Hall, the 52-year-old television personality clarifies her remarks about how she would have considered a “love affair” with a professional dancer had she not been in a committed relationship with David Charvet. (She married Charvet in 2011, and the couple split in 2018.)

Burke explains that she was referring to “the chemistry between the professional and the celebrity,” adding, “When you’re on a show like that, you’re dancing, you’re breathing, you’re in each other’s arms. You learn dance, rhythm, struggle, challenge, triumph, fear that you share when you step on the floor. It is an extremely intimate experience. Chemistry for sure.”

Brooke Burke and Derek Hough.

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Brooke Burke explains why she was almost tempted to have an ‘affair’ with Derek Hough during the win DWTS Season

“He is cute. He’s really like my younger brother, he said I would have an affair… I don’t know, maybe I was just chatting,” she continues. “We didn’t – let me get this straight – and I was in a faithful marriage. But it’s like that dance where you’re just, you’re so close and you’re so connected and that intimacy, you can’t fake it.”

The actress claimed DWTS The experience is “more than what most people go through in marriage.”

“You share. You are fighting. You compete, you learn, sometimes you fail,” she added. “You try to win, you communicate, you don’t communicate. You are fighting. you are laughing You are crying, you are scared out of your mind. So these are all human emotions. It was extremely sensual for me. Sensual, not sexual.”

Derek Hough and Brooke Burke.

Jason Mendez/Getty; Frazer Harrison/Getty

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After her comments about Hough, Burke says she warned her fiance Scott Rigsby, but he took it in stride.

“He’s so cool and we have such firm boundaries. And I have them in my second marriage, which is why I feel so free to be honest,” she explains. “I didn’t want to, couldn’t or shouldn’t have.” It was reality and the conversation of adults and the beautiful chemistry that happens and that’s why some people fall in love. But with Scott, I have to say, ‘Sorry, honey, you’re probably going to read a lot about this tomorrow.'”

Burke believes chemistry is part of it Dancing with the stars, explaining, “I think when you’re on the dance floor, the audience reads it, like you can’t act it. Or you’re looking forward and connected and fun to watch and telling a love story, with your bodies out there in a competition show. That’s what people react to. And people fall in love with that show. People got married on that show.”

Burke adds that she has no regrets about her comments, saying, “I’m comfortable communicating, I’m an adult, and I’m in a monogamous, faithful relationship.”

Brooke Burke and Derek Hough.

Kelsey McNeal/Disney General entertainment content via Getty

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Last week, Burke discussed her DWTS experience with Hough, 38, on pro alum Cheryl Burke’s podcast Sex, lies and spray tanning.

In the podcast, she recalled meeting Hough, saying, “I just thought he was so young and green and confident. I had no idea he was going to be such a powerful, bad choreographer.”

Although the two did not “get along” at first, a series of “hard-working” couples therapy arranged by the producers resulted in Burke “falling for Derek”. She added: “If I wasn’t married… I’d actually hope we’d have an affair… I don’t think I’ve ever said that!”

“I would have an affair with him,” she said. “But listen, let me tell you why: You’re intertwined with someone’s body when you’re not a dancer. There’s no way I’ve ever been as connected—other than a lover or a husband—as I have been with Derek. And every day. So, for three months, you’re in someone’s arms.”

“Why do you think people fall in love? You smell them, you feel them, you breathe with them. It can be more intimate than making love in the bedroom — you make love on the dance floor, you feel more connected,” she continued. “If you have energy, you dance this dance and you are in rhythm, and then there is trust, then you share fear, you do something you have never done. How many times do you go through an experience with someone where they are all you have?”

She summed up that she had “only had one experience with one such person [outside the ballroom]. Which is life-changing.”

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Tamron Hall airs weekdays (check local listings).

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Source: HIS Education