The one thing we agree on? We always get it right!
They’ve been pilloried by viewers for sending home Dev, Catherine and Emma. But here the Strictly judges tell Jenny Johnston why they HAD to go – and just how dangerous it can be on that panel
Who judges the judges? We all do, it seems. If this series of Strictly Come Dancing has been memorable for one thing (well, one thing apart from Kelvin Fletcher’s biceps) it’s been the public’s reaction when we think the four judges have got it wrong. The disquiet started early in the series when, after being found lacking in the all-important dance-off, DJ Dev Griffin was sent home. Cue howls of disapproval from the viewers, who might not have been entirely sure who Dev was but still had him down as one of the ones who could go all the way.
It was the same when actress Catherine Tyldesley was booted off. Catherine had displayed much goddess potential – at least enough, we thought, to get her wafting to Blackpool in a sea of tulle. Then she was voted off in favour of a man in bunny ears, for goodness sake. Magic Mike – or newsreader Mike Bushell, as he used to be known – then went on to survive another dance-off, despite having (to the inexpert eye anyway) all the grace of a garden gnome.
What’s going on, we asked in our droves. On Twitter, the judges were pilloried. Death threats were made, and head judge Shirley Ballas faced calls for her to stand down. Hilarious hysteria? Perhaps, but today the judges — together as they head for this weekend’s Blackpool special — are hitting back. And my, this lot can pack a punch.
They might have spent much of this series disagreeing, but here they’re on the same side. Craig Revel Horwood is the first to have a go when I suggest that their decisions have been a bit mad this year. ‘They’re the rules of the show, darling,’ he says. ‘We can only judge on the dance-off, and if a dancer does everything we ask of them – like Mike did in his dance-off against Catherine – then he is the one we will save. If I could have voted on the best dancer from the series, then it would have been a different matter. But it isn’t.
‘It’s like in professional sport. The best team in the world still might lose. In gymnastics, you can have the world champion defending their title and they fall off the bars – they’ll be marked down for that. If you go on what could be, or should be, you’re not judging that particular dance.’
Besides, he says pointedly, who put poor Catherine (and poor Dev, and poor Emma Weymouth) in the dance-off in the first place? ‘Don’t forget the audience is somewhat to blame. That particular week, Chris Ramsey clearly should have left because he’d done the worst dance.’
Shirley follows in a very Shirley manner, pointing out that in the much more brutal world of proper ballroom dancing, this is exactly what happens: the big-hitters can come a cropper. ‘A few years ago there was a big upset in the Amateur World Championships when Yulia Musikhina [half of the top-ranked couple in the world] lost,’ she says. ‘It was a huge shock, but that’s how it happens.’
Are they miffed to have their judging skills called into question, then? Yes, and yes, but new judge Motsi Mabuse, the sister of pro dancer Oti, seems more shell-shocked than the others. Although she’s been in the Strictly world for some time (she was a professional on the German version, and moved on to the judging panel there), the bear-pit nature of the British show has taken her by surprise.
‘There isn’t a dance-off on the German version [the couple with the lowest combined score from the judges and viewers is eliminated] so we don’t have all this,’ she says. ‘And it’s incredible how passionate people get about it. Here, everyone takes it all so seriously. In Germany it’s more lighthearted, it’s a fun programme there.’ She even suggests the hyper-critical public are the ones who are out of step. ‘People feel a sense of ownership here. Everyone feels they are an expert. It’s like watching ER makes you think: “I’m a doctor.”’
Catching up with the four judges mid-series is quite a riot, as is dressing them up for our photoshoot (we got them together before Shirley’s much-documented breast implant removal recently, hence her still ample chest). Although they film the show together on a Saturday, they go their separate ways after that. Bruno Tonioli, 63, flies to LA to film the US version, while Motsi, 38, heads home to Germany where her husband and baby daughter live. ‘That’s been a blessing,’ she admits. ‘I can switch off a bit from all the Strictly talk. No one is talking about it over there.’
Obviously Motsi’s arrival was the big shake-up this year. She’d known Shirley, 59, from the ballroom circuit, with Shirley having judged her in competitions. She describes Motsi as ‘supremely talented, and a ball of fire energy. She always did well with me. Thank goodness, eh?’ she laughs.
Previously, Shirley was sitting beside the very graceful and supremely demure Darcey Bussell. Motsi is certainly not Darcey. She has a tendency to fling her arms around and leap to her feet – just like Bruno on the other side of Shirley. ‘It’s meant that I’m squashed between two people who wave their arms around, and I might get whacked,’ Shirley agrees. ‘But it’s preferable to sitting beside Mr Miserable on the end.’
Actually, even Craig concedes that the programme is more fun with Motsi on board. ‘I loved Darcey, and she did a stellar job, but Motsi does bring a certain energy, and sometimes it’s good to shake things up. She changes the dynamic.’ How? ‘She’s more bouncy. She’s a Latin babe, not a ballet babe.’ He also likes the fact that she gives him a hard time. ‘We don’t necessarily agree, which is good. The only thing I have a problem with is her nails. They’re like talons. She’s nearly scratched my eye out.’
During the banter about who sits where, a long-forgotten fact emerges. In the very first episode of Strictly, Craig and Bruno sat at opposite ends of the table to where they sit now. It was the late Bruce Forsyth who suggested they switch. ‘It didn’t work like that,’ remembers Bruno. ‘I felt a bit out of it, and Bruce suggested I move
‘I DON’T WANT OTI TO MAKE THE MISTAKES THAT I MADE’ – MOTSI ‘I LOVED DARCEY, BUT MOTSI IS MORE BOUNCY’ – CRAIG
so that he and I could have a bit of banter. I needed that eye contact with him. With Craig, he was so aloof it didn’t matter.’ Craig agrees. ‘And Bruno could pick up the pieces if I’d made them cry.’
In the flesh, are they as they appear on Strictly? Well, Motsi and Shirley are, pretty much, although Shirley is kinder and softer than her scary on-screen persona can seem. It’s the men who surprise. Craig, 54, is quite a pussycat underneath those arched eyebrows. But Bruno admits he is the one who is least like his Strictly character. ‘I do play a character, a bit of a panto character too,’ he admits. ‘There has to be a bit of showmanship.’
Off camera he’s quieter, less given to bouncing off the ceiling. He likes history and classical music. On holiday he likes to go away on his own and not speak to another soul for two weeks.
Motsi, meanwhile, is a chatterbox, although interestingly she says she’s sometimes at a loss as to how to express herself. Although she and Oti grew up in South Africa, she has lived in Germany ‘for more of my life now’. She’s so used to talking about dancing in German, she says, that she’s been struggling to find the exact words in English.
‘I hadn’t realised it had affected my English,’ she admits. ‘But there are precise words in German to describe certain things, and I often think of the German word first.’
The new Strictly job came at a tricky time for Motsi, having just given birth. ‘But I couldn’t turn it down. It’s just a dream job.’
Her Ukrainian husband Evgenij Voznyuk, who’s also a dancer, still runs their dance school in Germany, but is a permanent move to the UK in the offing? While she says she’s not thinking beyond this
‘I MIGHT GET WHACKED, SQUASHED BETWEEN TWO ARM-WAVERS’ – SHIRLEY
series, she admits that she’s taken by the British education system, which offers the opportunity to specialise in the arts, specifically dance and music. ‘They don’t have that in Germany, but we will see,’ she says, leaving the question very much open.
In the shorter term, the highlight of the show for her is this weekend’s decamping to Blackpool. Yes, she has been previously — she has competed there twice.
‘But even before that, I knew it well. Everyone in the ballroom world knows Blackpool. Even in South Africa we would watch videos filmed in Blackpool. It’s iconic.’
Motsi helped to teach Oti to dance, so now that the siblings have both ended up on the same show is there any competition between them? No way, she says. As the big sister, she says her role in life is to support Oti, ‘and make sure she doesn’t make the same mistakes I have made’. On the dancefloor or in life? ‘In life.’
Even the most supportive sister must baulk a little at seeing her sibling’s raunchy routines with Kelvin. She whoops. ‘Yes, as much as you like a rumba, you don’t want to see your sister doing it.’
So are the four judges friends? Up to a point. Shirley says that if she gets married to her actor boyfriend Danny Taylor, who she met in panto, she will invite them all to her wedding.
‘They are my Strictly family,’ she says. Mind you, she invites me too, and we’ve only spoken for the first time today. ‘Buy a hat, darling.’
A bridesmaid’s dress for Craig, then? Maybe they should put in a mass order for sparkly attire. We know a good wardrobe department that could help out with some sequins.