‘Worst year’: What happened to Amanda Abbington and why has she delayed her wedding?
Pernice denied every accusation but the BBC has issued an apology, and several of Abbington’s objections were upheld after a BBC assessment.
The Sherlock actress claimed in an interview with The Times in March that she received “20 to 30 death threats a day” on social media, and her fiancé had had to defend himself from trolls who accused her of attempting to “ruin” Pernice’s career.
Abbington added that it has been a “weird 10 years”.
What has happened to Amanda Abbington in the last 10 years?
Divorce with Martin Freeman
In the past decade, the star broke up with Fargo and Sherlock actor Martin Freeman after 16 years together. Subsequently, she became engaged to Jonathan Goodwin, a contestant on Britain’s Got Talent but he was left disabled from the waist down because of an accident during preparations for America’s Got Talent: Extreme.
Abbington and Freeman met while working together on the set of the Men Only movie in 2000. After establishing a friendship, fireworks quickly erupted between the pair, who gradually started to fall deeply in love.
The pair proceeded to appear on screen together many more times, such as in The Debt, The Good Night and The Robinsons, but their most famous roles are arguably in Sherlock. They allowed their lives to merge both on and off screen.
The pair never revealed the reason for their split in 2016 but Abbington told the Sunday Times Magazine that the pair “couldn’t live with each other any more”.
In 2023, she said: “When we broke up nobody knew, we didn’t tell anybody except for a few key people because they had to know, because of the logistics of hotels and stuff. It took six months for it to get out and a lot of that was while we were working on Sherlock … We were professional and we were going to get on and make a show and be civil to each other.
“We still get on really well, we still really both admire each other as actors … he’s a great guy, but we just couldn’t live with each other any more.”
The pair have two children: Joe, 19, and Grace, 16.
Just over 10 years ago in 2013, Abbington was declared bankrupt over a £120,000 tax bill, which received significant media attention. Unhappy that her tax bill had been making headlines, she told the Radio Times: “It’s fine, it’s being sorted out. It was a big mistake and I’m sorting it out right now.
“It’s being paid off now. I would never want to go through this again. But I’m paying it off. It was just me not managing my finances properly. I was putting some money away (to pay tax) but not all of it. I was working one year and not working another year. So I was using the money I’d saved … It will be annulled in a couple of months.”
Moving forward 10 years, just as she was announced as joining Strictly Come Dancing in 2023, fans of the show were claiming on social media that they would boycott it over Abbington’s inclusion.
The actress had earlier tweeted that she disapproved of a drag show targeted at parents with newborns, calling it “abhorrent”, which sparked the criticism. She had also tweeted: “You cannot have a penis and be referred to as a woman.”
After the backlash, Abbington posted an apology video on Instagram (now deleted), clarifying her stance.
“I need to make this very clear,” she said. “I love drag. I think it’s an amazing form of entertainment and I fucking love drag queens. I think they’re hilarious and brilliant … it’s an art form and I think there’s absolutely a place for it in the entertainment industry. My son [Joe Freeman] played Jamie in Everybody’s Talking About Jamie, and he was a wonderful drag queen.”
Rewind on the Giovanni Pernice allegations on Strictly
Amanda Abbington left Strictly after a brief time on the show
PA Media
Abbington participated in the 2023 season of Strictly Come Dancing with Pernice, an eight-year member of the show’s professional dancers However, she withdrew after five weeks for “personal reasons” and eventually left the show.
In July 2024, she told the Sun in a statement that Pernice’s alleged behaviour was “unnecessary, abusive, cruel and mean” during their time on Strictly Come Dancing.
Her statement read: “I couldn’t sit back and let him do that to other people. I had to think long and hard about making a complaint because I knew the backlash I would get. But I would not have been able to live with myself for future people going on that show.
“I know what happened in that room, it’s on video and I have no problem with anyone seeing that. It’s a duty of care that is needed. Rehearsal rooms should be a safe space, there is a duty of care and kindness, and that courtesy wasn’t extended to me on this job. I was being as amenable as possible and it wasn’t being reciprocated, that’s all.”
In the days that followed, Abbington gave further statements to Channel 4.
Pernice immediately rejected any claims of “abusive and threatening behaviour” in a statement posted to his Instagram.
In the statement, Pernice wrote: “To my dear fans, you will be as surprised as I am that allegations have been made about my dance teaching methods in the media this week. Of course, I reject any suggestion of abusive or threatening behaviour, and I look forward to clearing my name.”
The BBC’s director general, Tim Davie, said he was “very sorry” and the corporation began an investigation into the allegations. It is understood that the BBC has not found any evidence of physical violence in its review, but accusations of verbal abuse and harassment were upheld.
Why are Abbington and Jonathan Goodwin delaying their wedding?
Abbington informed The Times they had originally planned to get married in 2025 but had postponed it until 2026 because of “litigation”, which the publication claimed was related to Goodwin.
The Strictly controversy and Goodwin’s accident, according to Abbington, left her and Goodwin feeling “definitely on the rollercoaster”.
She added: “Last year was one of the worst years of my entire life. I was very close to having a breakdown because of the constant barrage of abuse and hideousness.
“And you just think, ‘How can I refuel the positivity?’ And Jonathan was amazing. My friends were amazing. My kids were wonderful, though I was trying to shield them from it.”
The makers of America’s Got Talent: Extreme were sued by Goodwin in 2023 after he was crushed between two burning cars in 2021 while hanging upside down.
As for Abbington, she hasn’t ruled out taking the BBC to court.
And, despite the backlash for the allegations she made against Pernice, Abbington said stands by her decision to speak out.
“I’m glad that I stood up for myself because it’s the first time I’ve ever really done that,” she said.
Significant adjustments have been made to Strictly Come Dancing’s procedures since the BBC review. Celebrities and professional dancers now have chaperones throughout the show’s rehearsals and the BBC has revised its duty of care procedures.
