{"id":119555,"date":"2025-11-05T16:33:07","date_gmt":"2025-11-05T16:33:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/119555\/"},"modified":"2025-11-05T16:33:07","modified_gmt":"2025-11-05T16:33:07","slug":"nia-sioux-opens-up-about-racist-remarks-from-abby-lee-miller-in-memoir","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/119555\/","title":{"rendered":"Nia Sioux Opens Up About Racist Remarks From Abby Lee Miller in Memoir"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nia Sioux<\/a> is pulling back the curtain on her Dance Moms<\/a> experience \u2014 and revealing the disturbing reality she says she faced behind the cameras.<\/p>\n

In her new memoir, Bottom of the Pyramid: A Memoir of Persevering, Dancing for Myself, and Starring in My Own Life, the former Lifetime star details what it was like growing up on the hit reality show and alleges that her former teacher, Abby Lee Miller<\/a>, made racist and body-shaming comments throughout filming.<\/p>\n

Sioux, now 24, starred on Dance Moms for seven seasons alongside her mom, Holly Frazier, from 2011 to 2017. She was just 9 years old when the series began and 15 when it ended. Reflecting on her time in the spotlight, she says that the environment was often toxic \u2014 particularly when it came to Miller\u2019s treatment of her.<\/p>\n

\u201cAbby told me that I needed to fix my hair because it looked awful,\u201d Sioux writes in her memoir, recalling a moment from season two when she wore braids that had been approved by production. \u201cShe said \u2014 on camera, no less \u2014 \u2018It\u2019s like a log coming out of the side of her head.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

But that wasn\u2019t the only comment that crossed the line. Sioux claims another disturbing moment, which never aired, happened when Miller allegedly asked her, \u201cDon\u2019t you just wish you had white-girl hair?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI was taken aback by her question, but I responded, \u2018No,\u2019\u201d Sioux writes. \u201c\u2018Oh really?\u2019 she said. \u2018Like you don\u2019t think it would be much easier?\u2019 Again, I told her no. It didn\u2019t matter what she said \u2014 I knew I didn\u2019t want to be white. Unlike the other exchange, this one never aired.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to Sioux, the remarks didn\u2019t stop there. She says Miller often criticized her body and even spread racial stereotypes about her dancing ability. \u201cShe would say, \u2018Well, you know your people have flat feet,\u2019\u201d Sioux recalls. \u201cThis struck me as ignorant; I know plenty of Black dancers with perfectly arched feet! Yet, despite the fact that she actually believed this ridiculous generalization was true, she\u2019d threaten punishment for my perceived shortcoming. \u2018If you don\u2019t point that foot,\u2019 she\u2019d warn, \u2018I\u2019m gonna come out there and break it.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Sioux writes that Miller\u2019s behavior influenced others on set. \u201cComments came directly from Abby and trickled down to some of the girls and their moms, criticizing my thighs, my butt, and even my muscular legs,\u201d she says. \u201cAt one point in season 6, Abby talked about the size of my thighs in the dressing room. She implied that I was fat because I was not working hard enough. This was just one of many comments Abby made to create an illusion that I was lazy or just not strong as a dancer. Viewers and some of my castmates ate that up without question.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sioux also recalls that several of her solos choreographed under Miller had troubling racial undertones \u2014 even before the show began filming. Her first solo was to a song called \u201cNattie of the Jungle,\u201d about a child raised by monkeys, followed by another routine to \u201cSatan\u2019s Li\u2019l Lamb.\u201d<\/p>\n

Her mom, Holly, often confronted Miller about the choices but sometimes \u201chad to bite her tongue,\u201d Sioux writes, explaining that as a child, she was too young to grasp the deeper implications and simply excited to perform.<\/p>\n

Bottom of the Pyramid: A Memoir of Persevering, Dancing for Myself, and Starring in My Own Life is available now wherever books are sold.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Nia Sioux is pulling back the curtain on her Dance Moms experience \u2014 and revealing the disturbing reality…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":119556,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[430,156,111,139,69],"class_list":["post-119555","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119555","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=119555"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119555\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/119556"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=119555"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=119555"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=119555"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}