Ahead of the forthcoming ‘Strictly Come Dancing’ series, two of the brand new dancers have been criticised for performing a routine, dressed in fat suits.
A video has emerged of married couple Neil and Katya Jones, two of the professionals unveiled last month for the hit BBC1 ballroom dancing show, in the oversized outfits.
The couple were competing back in 2014 in the Professional Latin World Show-dance Championship when they donned the outfits for a number they called ‘Fat ChaCha’, which they concluded by pretending to be out of breath.
They immediately sparked criticism when the video emerged, with viewers slamming them for bad taste. One commenter on social media wrote: “Your fat suit routine is a disgrace to the dance community. Dance should be positive and inclusive and your shameful routine is in extremely poor taste.”
Another said: “Fat ChaCha by Neil and Ekaterina Jones is fat shaming and stigmatising, wearing fat suits to ridicule fat bodies is harmful.”
There were also some voicing concerns that the routine would discourage overweight participants from taking up dance.
Their spokesperson has said in response to the criticism:
“Neil and Katya’s show-dance was never intended to offend - the pair were placed second on the competition.”
Neil and Katya were two of the new dancers unveiled last month for the forthcoming series of ‘Strictly’ - following the departure of stars Gleb Savchenko, Aliona Vilani, Ola Jordan, Kristina Rihannof and Tristan MacManus.
Tap the first picture below to open our slideshow:
