Tag Archives: viennese waltz

Strictly Come Dancing 2020: week 2 recap – Jacqui Smith trotted round the ballroom like a drunk pony

As England is plunged back into lockdown, Jacqui Smith is locked out of the ballroom – and rightly so. Read my full Telegraph article here

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Strictly Speaking: The Final

We came to the end! The week’s second nationwide ballot (and, let’s face it, by far the more important) yielded – in my humble opinion – exactly the right result, with the consistently brilliant Kelvin and Oti lifting the glitterball … Continue reading

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Strictly Come Dancing, Grand Final: Brilliant Fletcher and Mabuse show power in simplicity

Kelvin Fletcher and partner Oti Mabuse were the incredibly worthy winners of Strictly 2019. The super sub, drafted at the last minute to replace an injured Jamie Laing, turned out to the secret weapon of this series – the modest, … Continue reading

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Strictly Come Dancing 2019 semi-final: who danced it best? Kelvin Fletcher is the technical master across two dances

By this stage, our celebrities can handle one dance – but two? That separates the contenders from the pretenders, as Len Goodman used to say. Leading contender, and surely hot favourite for the trophy, is Kelvin Fletcher, who impressed in … Continue reading

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Strictly Speaking: Week 2

Ah, the Strictly Week 2 comedown – very much the morning after to Week 1’s revelry. It didn’t help that the show was frontloaded with… let’s say imperfect performances, meaning viewers really had to hang on in there before finally getting to ballroom boys … Continue reading

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Strictly Speaking: Week 7

Post-Halloween Week, and it’s possible the judges were still hopped up on Haribo and egging unsuspecting strangers, with the series’ most inconsistent show so far in terms of scoring and comments. Of course, Strictly is a mix of dancing and … Continue reading

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Strictly Speaking: Week 6

Ah, Halloween Week – the annual dumbing down of Strictly. Why have subtext or delicate concepts when you can instead bumble about dressed in the most thuddingly literal, kids-dressing-up-box interpretations of groaningly repeated and/or entirely insane songs? Read my full Dancing … Continue reading

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Strictly Speaking: Week 12

Two dances is theoretically a good test of range, growth and performance at this crucial stage, but can often make for a night of half-finished numbers – the pros’ steely ambition exceeding the knackered celebs’ execution. So it proved in … Continue reading

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More Strictly chat on Georgey Spanswick

I joined Georgey Spanswick again on her BBC radio show to talk Strictly. Click here to listen to the interview (I’m on at about 2hr 38min)

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Strictly Speaking: Week 7

WHAT. DRAMA. Week 7, and this series of Strictly serves up its first proper “shock” exit – Aston Merrygold joining the likes of Pixie Lott and Gabby Logan in the Surprise Early Departure Lounge. Read my full Dancing Times blog here

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