Evening Standard – 28 January 2008

The success of Strictly Come Dancing took many by surprise, but the 12 million of us who sat glued to the finale never had any doubts. We love ballroom dancing. We love its glamour, grace and good manners. We’re bored with gobby D-listers. We hate sullen models and their rubbish boyfriends. We want nice dresses and proper parties. We want people who know how to dance and how to behave. We want to go to the ball, and with Strictly Come Dancing we can. The BBC was quick to recognise the money-spinning potential, and sold the format hither and yon. Now there’s a live show and its brilliant fun. Like the tellie, it has waltzing celebrities (Zoe Ball, Letitia Dean, etc), audience voting and professional hoofers. There’s chandeliers, glitterballs, and ooh-ing and ahh-ing plus a ring ding band and tip-top singers. Brucie and Bruno can’t be with us, but Kate Thornton does a respectable turn as mistress of ceremonies and the three judges are as funny and insightful as ever. Who won? My personal celebrity winner was Letitia Dean who waltzed with voluptuous glory and jived with sass and sizzle. After dancing her socks off she pointed to her breasts and said: “It’s not easy being 40 and jumping around with these two”.