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Shirley Ballas talks to Caroline Leaper about surgery, Strictly trolls and love
The true star of Strictly, Shirley Ballas has gone from a Merseyside council estate to TV’S most infamous judging panel, via LA and two marriages. Ahead of tonight’s final, she talks to Caroline Leaper about her much-publicised breast-implant removal, battling online bullies and why at long last she’s determined to enjoy Christmas
The font is very large on Shirley Ballas’s mobile phone, but she still puts her glasses on as she opens her Whatsapp messages. She scrolls past texts from her boyfriend, the stage actor Daniel Taylor, in search of pictures of her recently removed breast implants. She turns the phone to show me; her exposed ribs, the emptied cavities in her chest, the two extracted pads of silicone gel and the pair of flesh sacks which had grown around them.
‘Are you squeamish?’ Ballas checks. ‘I asked Dr Waterhouse to take those pictures. I wanted a 100 per cent guarantee he could get all of that out. The big pieces that look like steak, those are the capsules that grow around the implant to protect the body from what is essentially a foreign entity you’ve put inside it. No one ever showed me that. I take the blame myself, I don’t think I did enough research. But if I could go back to my younger self, had people shown me photos like these, I don’t think I would have had them done.’
Ballas, 59, underwent the surgery on Tuesday 29 October, which took her from a 34DD cup to a 32B; and made headlines four days later when, against the doctor’s advice, she went back to work as head judge on BBC’S Strictly Come Dancing on the Saturday night.
‘I had to have the operation,’ she insists. ‘In the summer I did Who Do You Think You
Are?, and found out that my great-grandfather had died from cancer at thirtysomething. My mother’s older sister died of cancer, my mother has just had colon cancer, my auntie [her other sister] currently has vaginal cancer. Then I started thinking, do these implants have any link to cancer? Do these implants have anything to do with why I’m getting tired or fatigued? I had a mammogram and the nurse said, “We can’t see behind these implants, you know that, don’t you?” As soon as she said it, that was it. I spoke to my son, my boyfriend and my mother about it. Mum was delighted
I was removing them, she didn’t think I needed them in the first place.’
We meet at Ballas’s double-fronted neogeorgian home in Dulwich, south-east London, ahead of Strictly’s Blackpool week, two days after television presenter Mike Bushell was eliminated from the show, and two weeks into Ballas’s eight-week recovery.
The only indicators of her profession on display are a scattering of dance trophies and sculptures. Her house is immaculate; American in taste, it’s decorated in white with marble worktops and grey leather recliners.
Ballas had greeted me at the front door in a yellow Disneyland rain coat and a mint cashmere jumper – no sequins. Behind closed doors she seems smaller and softer.
She climbs up on the stool at her breakfast bar to talk about her extraordinary life over coffee. The decision to have the operation midway through her third Strictly series, and to return to work immediately afterwards, was, she tells me, entirely her own.
‘I made a commitment to the BBC,’ she reasons. ‘Even though they were fully supportive and said to come back whenever I was comfortable, I just thought it’s not like I’m dancing. Was I uncomfortable after the operation? Yes. But [my fellow judges] Craig, Motsi and Bruno were amazing. Bruno was desperately trying to watch his flailing arms.’
Ballas typically wears ballgowns on Saturday nights – the ballroom-dancing world is known for its unwavering commitment to sparkle, whether you’re performing or not. But, still tender after her operation, a corseted dress wasn’t an option for her return. Instead, Ballas and her stylist Alexandria Reid picked a black satin tuxedo and a white shirt. ‘She put me in a power suit,’ Ballas says, ‘so I was ultra-comfortable. She’s pulling in some different styles for me at the moment because the clothes need to be comfortable.’
Ballas is adamant that her change of size won’t affect her personal style. She may have had a DD cup before, but she says her silhouette of choice – a waist-defining, cleavage-raising, floor-sweeping gown – will not alter. ‘It hasn’t changed how I’m getting dressed,’ she says. ‘I’m the same person. Actually, what I’ve realised is I don’t exactly have small boobs myself. I’ve got a good full B. I thought I was going to be an A-B, but now it’s turning out like it’s a full B [once the swelling has gone down].’
Glamour has always been inherent in Ballas’s life. ‘I’ve been in an industry of glitz since I was a little girl,’ she says. ‘I’m always going to love to wear eveningwear and eyelashes. For Strictly, when you go out on a Saturday, you want to look your best for the public. I can’t go out there in my jogging bottoms.’
But her perception of what is glamorous has altered slightly with age. It’s a shift that is most evident in her attitude towards what she looks like when she’s off duty (almost everything she wears off-screen is from Marks & Spencer, she says) and it is, in part, down to how she feels with her new boyfriend, who is 12 years younger than her.
‘When I was with my second husband, I’d always paint my nails and go to bed with my make-up on; he loved all that,’ she says. ‘When I first met Danny I didn’t know how to be. You go off past experiences. I’m 59, I’m thinking, I don’t know what he likes or what the right thing to do is. Then, one evening, he was like, “Are you going to bed with your make-up on?” He took off my eyelashes and wiped all the make-up off. He goes, “There
‘After my operation, Bruno was desperately trying to watch his flailing arms’
she is, that’s the girl I fell in love with.” That, for me, was a huge rock off my back.
‘It’s the first time I’ve felt like that with someone,’ she continues. “It was a realisation; you can be yourself and be more comfortable if you want. I had already started a bit of self-healing before I met Danny. But he was the icing on the cake.’
Ballas is the first to admit that when she had her breast augmentation surgery 17 years ago, she was in a very different place. She was married to her second husband, the Texan millionaire-turned-dancer Corky Ballas and was raising their then-teenage son, Mark. Both have suggested in the past that they had affairs during their marriage.
‘I had low self-esteem,’ she reflects. ‘I’ve always had body issues. I thought I would look better for my ex-husband [Corky] and he would find me more desirable. But if somebody doesn’t love you, they don’t love you and you CANNOT – I want to put that in block capitals – make somebody love you. You cannot alter your body for somebody else. What I’ve realised now is that I just want to be comfortable in my own skin.’
Born Shirley Rich, she was raised with her older brother, David, on a council estate in Wallasey, Merseyside, by her single mother, Audrey, who juggled part-time jobs at a chocolate factory, and even worked as a forklifttruck driver, to make ends meet. Ballas fell in love with dancing as a child, competing seriously by the age of 11. ‘My mother had people telling her, “Stop ploughing what little money you’ve got into that child [on dance classes], no one gets off this housing estate.” My mother said, “As long as she walks those miles in the rain to the dance class, I will support her.”’
At 15 she partnered with the young British Ballroom Champion Nigel Tiffany. At 16
they were engaged. The couple moved to Croydon, where she worked as a secretary and Nigel as an insurance broker, funding their way through competitions. Shirley then auditioned to partner the country’s new top Latin dancer, Sammy Stopford, got the part, and got dumped by Nigel the same day.
The ‘Unstoppable Stopfords’ became British champions, married at 18, and split in 1984. Conveniently, just before she tells me this part of the story, there is a knock at Ballas’s front door. It’s Sammy himself – he lives next door now, with his wife Barbara and son Samuel. They are great friends; he’s dropping off some food for Shirley to reheat for dinner. ‘That was my first husband,’ Ballas smiles as she places the care parcel in a Tesco bag into the fridge. ‘I married him when I was 18; now he’s my neighbour.’
The Stopfords split after five years, around the time
Shirley was invited to coach Corky Ballas in America. She moved to the US, took Ballas, a relative beginner, and in a move that shocked the British ballroom dancing world, trained him to be a professional dancer. They married in 1985, and had their son Mark in 1986.
Ballas’s drive, she admits, has always come from a determination to impress other people. She can describe many times in her life when hard work and grit have helped her to prevail. In 1990, she made the decision to move back to the UK with Corky.
‘Everybody told me you will never make it again [in the British dance world after leaving Stopford]. You left this country, go back to America, have your baby, it’s too late,’ she remembers. ‘I thought, “I will be the one to decide if it’s too late for me.” I always felt in my life I had something to prove. To myself, and to anyone who ever said I wouldn’t amount to anything.’ She went on to win the British Championships with Corky in 1995 and 1996. ‘I will always be competitive with myself and have OCD,’ she says. ‘Experience comes with age, I’m still trying to cool it a bit.’
Anxiety has been less manageable for Ballas in the past, she says, and she has found she is able to repress it by talking to friends and family. She set up The Ballas Foundation in 2010 to support others who struggle with depression, after her brother David took his own life in 2003. ‘When my brother died, it was so unexpected,’ she says. ‘I can go right back to it. That anniversary is coming up – it can be a cause for being anxious, just seeing how my mum [now 82] reacts and if she’s OK. She’ll never get over it, of course.
‘I’ve had ups and downs throughout the years, where I’m not always in that stable place,’ she continues. ‘Everybody feels low, I don’t care who they are. I’ve been through two divorces; right now I’m separated from my son. He’s living in Los Angeles with his wife [singer BC Jean]. I just need to hear his voice for a minute each day, otherwise I can’t sleep.’ David Rich died just before Christmas and, as such, Ballas has felt unable to embrace the festive season properly since. She
took in his daughter, Mary, and raised her alongside her own son Mark and, at one point, Derek and Julianne Hough, two American dancers whom Ballas looked after when they were teenagers training in the UK.
‘Danny has helped me a lot with [seeing Christmas time differently],’ she says. ‘We are going to be performing together in panto in Darlington and the first thing I will do when we check into our room is buy a tree.’ Landing the job as head judge on Strictly
Come Dancing in 2017 and finding fame almost overnight at 57, Ballas says, has also contributed to her self-confidence. ‘It’s one day a week of pure bliss,’ she smiles. ‘Going to work is like stepping into a bubble, separate from the outside world. It’s like a family.’
Taking over from the established Len Goodman, Ballas says, was nerve-racking. As the new head of the British panel, she was required to be a spokesperson for the show. ‘The first series was tough because of the pressure that I put myself under to understand the media,’ she says. She also ‘commuted’ from her home of 12 years in Los Angeles for the first two series, before moving back to London permanently early this year. ‘But this current series has been difficult. When I saw everyone, I knew it was going to be hard [because the contestants were generally younger]. I’m noticing the worst trolling this season.
‘Every week I’ve got to send someone home from the bottom two – it’s the job,’ she says. ‘But ever since we had Joe Sugg on and then this time we’ve had Saffron [Barker, Youtube star], they’re social-media people, and with them come a lot of very young fans. Those fans don’t understand what your mum is thinking when she’s watching the TV; she just gets on with her day after she’s watched. This is 12- to 18-year-olds spewing hate. They direct message me: “I want you to die.” I reply sometimes, I give them a chance because they’re young people. You can [choose not to] read it, I know. But sometimes I think a soul is worth saving if you can teach somebody.’
The hate and the heat directed at Ballas has been intensified in the tabloid press this series, too. Perhaps more than any of the other judges, Ballas prides herself on her constructive, technical critiques. Her comments to the Viscountess Emma Weymouth, and then the Eastenders actress Emma Barton saw her accused of deliberately picking on young female contestants.
‘I think, if I was a man, I wouldn’t get half of what I get. I think it’s really digged personally [to attack me as an individual]. I loved Emma [Weymouth; at time of going to press Emma Barton is still in the competition], I thought she was great. Anybody who knows me knows I love young talent and to see someone come from being a beginner to display as well as she did. But everyone has an opinion. And that’s what makes the show a success.’
Ballas is becoming something of a socialmedia personality herself. She and Taylor enjoy posting selfies and videos together on Instagram to speak about health issues and to highlight charities they’re interested in.
‘Sometimes I wonder if we overshare,’ she admits, ‘but Danny did a post about getting yourself checked [for cancer] the other day and he got so many positive messages from people who said they were inspired by it.’
Ballas relaxes visibly when she’s talking about Taylor. The pair met last November when they starred in panto together; he was the villain and she was Mother Nature in
Jack and the Beanstalk at the Liverpool Empire. He’s saved in her phone, in fact, under his character name, ‘Fleshcreep’.
‘He’s from Liverpool, he’s an actor, he’s not a dancer, he doesn’t want to win the British Championships,’ she says, sounding relieved. ‘I’ve had a few boyfriends and all they wanted to do was succeed in their dancing. But with him, he doesn’t even really watch the show because he’s usually working on stage at that time [Taylor is currently starring in Blood
Brothers, which is touring the UK]. We have a lot of similarities; he comes from a caravan park, I come from a housing estate. We have both worked very hard to get where we are; we love people; we love our families and we love charity work. Everything’s easy with us, there’s no ranting or screaming.’
She describes Taylor, 47, as her ‘soulmate’. The couple were good friends for several months before deciding to take things further. ‘We hooked up probably around March,’ she says. ‘He was coming out of a 15year relationship, he has an eight-year-old son. I was there for him, he was there for me and that’s how it blossomed. There is an age gap; we don’t care. We talked about it at the beginning and it’s just not a big deal.’
Ballas dismisses the tabloid rumours that the couple are secretly engaged, although she says that she still believes in marriage and would like to marry him, maybe, possibly, one day. ‘Of course I would. He’s definitely right for me and I feel he thinks I’m right for him.’
Next year Ballas will be 60, a milestone she says she is looking forward to. Between the new boyfriend, the new house, moving away from her son, the operation, the family illnesses and the rougher ride on Strictly, she describes 2019 as having been a ‘massive year’.
‘I will be having a party,’ she decides. ‘I have a much better social life here than I had in the United States. I just went to work, came home, watched Law & Order. I can count on one hand the amount of times I went out in 12 years. Here, my best friend of 50 years, Karen Hilton [a former dancer whom Ballas met and competed with from the age of 11], lives over the road, my first husband and his beautiful family live a stone’s throw away. All my friends are near. I love entertaining now, I’m practising my cooking skills when I previously couldn’t do an egg in the microwave.’
I ask her whether, in light of her operation and all that she’s learnt, she would ever have cosmetic surgery again. I admire her honesty. ‘Never say never,’ she says, wincing slightly. ‘I have in the past had the Vampire Facial, where they take your own blood and then reinject it back into your face to plump it up. I have got a little bit of Botox in the past, once or twice a year, but I’ve had no facelifts, I’ve got no fillers in my lips, I’ve got no fake cheekbones or chin implants. I think I’m doing all right for nearly 60, aren’t I?’
Perhaps soon she’ll truly believe it.
‘Twelve- to 18-year-olds direct message me: “I want you to die.” I reply sometimes’
The Strictly Come Dancing final is tonight on BBC One