Strictly Come Dancing is about to make its long-awaited return – and this year marks the Bafta-winning show’s landmark 20th series.
The 15 celebrities putting their dance skills to the test this time around were announced last month, with stars from the world of TV, sport, music and beyond currently in training ahead of their ballroom debuts.
In the lead-up to the launch, HuffPost UK was among the media outlets who got to sit down with this year’s stars to talk about all things Strictly after they were put through their paces on their first day of training.
Here’s what the celebrities had to tell us…
The famous contestants weren’t exactly eased in gently on their first day of training
“It was a wake-up call,” Will Mellor admitted. “It’s like, ‘we’re in this now’. I loved it. But today my hips are aching and I feel like I’ve been run over a little bit.”
Kym Marsh agreed: “I think we all thought we’d go in yesterday and do a little bit and then ‘that’s that’. But it was more full-on than we thought it was going to be. In a good way! But I’ve never sweated so much in a long time.”
“I’m like a pug [panting] on the dance floor, and they’re like, ‘run it again’ and I’m like, ‘I can’t’,” said Tyler West.
There’s one particular part of the dancing that is giving some contestants cause for concern
Tyler said: “I’m nervous about the lifts, because although I go to the gym and everything like that, I work out and I feel quite physically strong, doing [lifts] after doing a whole minute of running around the dance floor, is mad.”
“And there’s a human at the top of it!” agreed Hamza Yassin. “When you’re lifting weights, it’s weights, that’s fine.”
And it sounds like one contestant in particular might be a dark horse thanks to her dance history
“Picking up routines is not going to be hard for me, because I’ve got a memory for routines because of free-style disco dancing when I was a kid,” Jayde Adams revealed.
“That stuff stays with you forever.”
Although Matt Goss doesn’t think his own performance background is going to help him out in the ballroom
“The very thing that’s going to be a hindrance to us is we’re not told, ‘you must put your foot there, leave it there, you must move this way, you must do this…’,” the Bros star claimed.
“The reason [myself and fellow singer Fleur East] didn’t want proper jobs is because we don’t like to be told what to do on stage. And when you do it for so long, it is a hard habit to break.”
Kym Marsh had ‘toyed with the idea’ of saying yes to Strictly for several years before signing up
“The last few years, I’ve toyed with the idea, but never thought it was the right time for me,” she admitted. “And then I decided that this year would be a good year.
“It’s the 20th anniversary, and it’s going to be a big one. And also, my husband [army major Scott Ratcliff] is still in the country at the moment, and next year he may very well not be, so I thought, ‘let’s do it’. And also, my dad’s not too well, so it was a good year to do it.”
Will Mellor also agreed that he would ‘never have said yes’ years earlier
He said: “When you lose people, you start to realise, life’s short, and you’ve got to say ‘yes’ to more things. I’d never have said yes to this a while back, my mindset was a bit frightened of doing things in case it ruined other opportunities.
“And now I’m just like, ‘yes! Do things!’. They might frighten you a bit, but you probably get more out of them because they’re harder. But you’re creating memories.”
“It’s my mum’s favourite show, she’s had a hard time of it, so let’s put some smiles on people’s faces, have some fun and just enjoy it,” he added. “That’s all it is.”
Matt also had a personal reason for signing up for Strictly in 2022
“The 11 years in Vegas was an incredible experience, and to be a headliner there is an honour,” he said of his long-held residency, but admitted: “I wasn’t happy at the end. And I found myself just doing shows, and on the way home I’d be feeling really empty.
“As a singer, it’s very hard to say that, because singing is my joy. It’s my peace. And I felt disconnected, and I knew that I’d become very reclusive.”
He continued: “It just so happened that I made the decision after the success of my last record, to come back to the UK. Strictly called, and I thought, ‘if I don’t do this, in a way, I’m just going to go back to my comfort zone of just working…’.
“I’ve gone through grief, and I just wanted to live a bit more and be happy. And Strictly… it’s a joy.”
Of the existing crop of Loose Women presenters, Kaye Adams is the eighth to sign up for Strictly, and her fellow panellists have been full of advice
“They’ve been amazing, they really have,” Kaye said of her Loose Women co-stars. “They absolutely loved it. And so, their enthusiasm is kind of infectious. They basically said to me, ‘don’t screw it up, go in and give it everything’.
“[So many] Loose Women have done Strictly now, and I couldn’t tell you how far they all got. I know Frankie [Bridge] did really well, she got to the final, but that’s not something we’ve ever really discussed. The real thing is, ‘did you enjoy it?’... and [even] Judi [Love], she had a tough time because of Covid and things like that, but she loved it.”
Meanwhile, football legend Tony Adams admits he was advised against it by his peers
“They all said, ‘don’t do it, don’t be stupid, what are you doing?’,” he said of his football pals, before adding: “But I’m at a stage of my life where I feel like I can do anything. I’m free of addiction, I’ve not taken a single drug for 26 years, and I just want to go into it and have some fun.”
Oh and by the way, if you can’t believe how many “Adamses” have signed up this year, neither can Jayde
“I couldn’t believe they just kept on coming,” she joked. “I was like, ‘who’s next, Bryan? Victoria?’.”
One person who still can’t get over landing a place on the show is superfan Richie Anderson
“I can’t believe I’m on Strictly, it’s so amazing, it makes my soul glow,” the Radio 2 star said. “Every year, I always have a big cocktail party at my house on launch night, and obviously we had to cancel this year – my mum’s fuming.
“I’ve been to see three arena tours in the past, I managed to get second row one year. I’ve been an audience member at It Takes Two twice. This year, I wanted to get audience tickets for the main show but I got a call to be on the show, so it’s the best upgrade ever!”
Kym Marsh has already had a mishap that brought her closer to co-stars
The morning after her first day of training, she shared: “Last night, the plan was my husband would drive here and bring my suitcase so that I wouldn’t have to take it with me on the train. But he ended up getting carried away mowing the lawn, doing god knows what else, and I finished quite early.
“I got back in, and I thought, ‘I’ve got no clothes, I’ve not got a change of underwear, I’ve got nothing at all with me, nothing to take my makeup off, I was sweating’... so I put it on the WhatsApp group, and next thing, Jayde is downstairs with something for me to borrow, and she’d ordered me all this stuff on Deliveroo! My point is, everyone suddenly went like that, and it was such a nice thing.”
And she’s not the only one already feeling the team spirit – with good reason
“I’m so giddy, I’m like, ‘let’s go for a meal, let’s go for a drink’, and everybody’s like, ’fuck off’’,” joked Helen Skelton. “But I’m normally on my own [in work situations]. That’s the nice thing for me about this.
“In our world you’re often on your own – not in a lonely way, it’s just the nature of your work. If I do radio, I’ll be on my own. Whereas with this, it’s nice to be around people that are in the same world. And it’s nice to be sharing something in a team, it’s that team mentality.”
She added: “When I did Antarctica [with Blue Peter], they intentionally got me a non-English-speaking soundman, because they wanted me to be on my own.
“Like, a real explorer would be on their own, [so they said that] if I was with an English-speaking crew, everyone would be like, ‘go on Helen!’, and they wanted me to have the real experience. So for this… that’s why I’m talking a lot!”
The EastEnders team has been making sure James Bye has plenty of time to throw himself into the Strictly experience
“At the moment, while the show starts, they’ve given me a bit of time to just sort of prep and get involved,” he revealed. “They’ve been great, in the sense that they’ve quietened [my character] down a bit, allowed me to do as much as I can for Strictly.
“I don’t know if that’s going to continue for the rest of the journey, but they’ve been fantastic up to now, yeah.”
And Ellie Simmonds is also full of praise for the Strictly team
“They’ve been amazing,” the Paralympian said. “I’ve been able to go around the studio, to make sure that things work for me. Even simple things like they’ve given me lower rails to hang my outfits on.
“We get physio support, psychologist support… it’s been the best inclusivity and support that I’ve ever [had on a TV show]. They’re a really lovely group of people.”
Former Britain’s Got Talent star Molly Rainford’s prior experience on Saturday night TV hasn’t done anything to ease her nerves
“When I was 11 I don’t think I knew what I was getting myself into, whereas now I kind of do,” she explained.
“Now I know this is pretty massive, so I’m definitely more nervous now than I was when I was little.”
Whereas Kym’s own reality TV past has apparently given her a tough skin
“Nothing could be worse than that! Getting called fat on television!” she said of her Popstars days. “I [still] think it’s going to be dreadful, but we’re all open to that, aren’t we?”
Ellie Simmonds wasn’t quite ready for just how many people would be tuning in for the first live show
“Someone was saying this morning, there are millions and millions of people watching,” the five-time gold medallist revealed. “I thought it was one million – that’d be alright! But it’s millions and millions!
“I’m super nervous, but nerves are good.”
Meanwhile, her namesake Ellie Taylor is most excited about one viewer in particular
“Strictly is such family viewing, and it’s the first show I’ve been in that my daughter, who is nearly four, might be able to watch and understand,” she said.
“And just seeing mummy in a pretty dress, lots of that. It’s lovely, and it’s such a lovely thing to be a part of.”
And Fleur East is keen to include her heritage in a future performance
The former X Factor finalist told us: “My mum is from Ghana, West Africa, and I grew up on highlife music and Afrobeats, and stuff like that.
“It’d be really fun to maybe do something like. It’s hard – the show has been on for 20 years, so everything has been done. It’d be fun to try and do something different.”
Strictly Come Dancing returns for its landmark 20th series with a pre-recorded launch show on Friday 23 September, with the first live show of the series airing the following night on BBC One.
