Strictly star Debbie McGee blasts back at critics who say she has an unfair advantage as she claims past dance training has actually held her back
Strictly star Debbie McGee has hit back at critics who claim she has an unfair advantage because of her previous dance training.
McGee, who studied ballet, said she was having to learn every single dance from scratch and she said her previous experience of treading the boards was actually a disadvantage.
The 59-year-old said: ‘The people who say that really have no understanding of dance. When I did ballet I stopped as a dancer when I was about 23.
Strictly star Debbie McGee has hit back at critics who claim she has an unfair advantage because of her previous dance training
‘That training in a way is a disadvantage because the muscles were trained differently. I haven’t done that for over 30 years.’
Some viewers say it is ‘unfair’ that McGee, one of the favourites to win, danced with the Iranian National Ballet in the 1970s and established her own company, Ballet Imaginaire.
One wrote: ‘Debbie McGee had ballet and dance training up to a few years ago, it’s blindingly obvious.’
Speaking before last night’s live quarter-final, in which she danced an American smooth to Memory from Cats with Giovanni Pernice, Debbie added: ‘What people keep saying is I make it look so easy.
'But they don’t realise the training I put in and how awful I am on Monday and the progress I make between a Monday and a Saturday. You need to ask Giovanni about that.’
McGee, who studied ballet, said she was having to learn every single dance from scratch and she said her previous experience of treading the boards was actually a disadvantage
Debbie, who lost her husband Paul Daniels last year, added she was flattered that people thought she might be in a relationship with 27-year-old Pernice, nicknamed the Italian Stallion. But she insisted they were just good friends.
She said: ‘For a woman of my age it’s very flattering, but we just have the greatest working partnership and we do have chemistry.’
Also dancing were Mollie King and AJ Pritchard, doing a rumba to Hopelessly Devoted To You from Grease, and Alexandra Burke and Gorka Marquez with a Charleston to Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious from Mary Poppins.
- Trump secures major victory as Senate Republicans pass...
- The warring neighbours who turned their homes into...
- Indiana pastor remarries after his first wife was...
- Death threat sent to Amir Khan for 'betraying' Islam...
- Chinese prisoner being led to his execution breaks down...
- The most extraordinary people of 2017: Barcroft photo...
- Man with the 'world's largest penis' is registered...
- Kim Jong-un is testing new warheads loaded with ANTHRAX...
- How many more texts have police 'sat on'? Hundreds of...
- Are you a winner or a loser? How the Trump tax cut...
- 'I'm sorry for how I murdered them all but I had no other...
- Columbia student, 28, and former Army Ranger posts...
- Billionaire Koch heir sues his ex-fiancee to get back...
- Matt Damon backs out of Downsizing premiere after his...
- Professional footballer's wife who suggested drinker was...
- 'They were neglected': Beloved dogs that ate their owner,...
- Revealed: Boy, 5, who drowned when he was left to 'fend...
- Catt Sadler leaves E! News' following 10 years at the...