Tess Daly has been presenting Strictly Come Dancing from the very beginning and has been there through it all – from the first ten of each series to witnessing the rise of the infamous curse that the show is renowned for. But ever the professional, the mother-of-two has revealed that Strictly deals with the extra media attention by simply carrying on as usual and focusing on the dances on the show each Saturday night. During her recent appearance on podcast Scummy Mummies, Tess was asked about what it was like off-screen in the aftermath of Katya Jones and Seann Walsh's kiss, which hit headlines during the show.
Tess Daly was asked about the Strictly scandals including Seann Walsh and Katya Jones' kiss in 2018
She was asked: "You often have to go on air and there has been drama off-screen, and we had Rebecca Humphries on the podcast who is Seann Walsh's ex-girlfriend, so last year all of that was going on and you have to go out there and be like jolly ringmaster and everything is fine. Is that difficult?" Tess carefully replied: "We react to what is happening live in the studio and so the show goes on. You know, it's live, so the show must go on. So we are there to talk about dance in the studio and the stuff that goes on outside and in the media, we don't discuss that live. It's just a reaction to those 90 seconds on the dance floor. I mean that's my job, I'm not going to stand there and then pull up a sofa and start talking in a Jeremy Kyle fashion."
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Tess Daly presents Strictly with Claudia Winkleman
Prompted further on her reaction to last year's kissing scandal, Tess was asked: "But was there a particular atmosphere in the room?" to which she answered: "Ermm, not really, because you know the pro dancers are pro and the show must go on. So it didn't really change the atmosphere as such, not really. Because there are all the people who are dancing and it sort of transcends that if you like, the atmosphere in the live studio is so overwhelming, there's so much excitement as they are getting ready to dance live so it's all about that moment really for us. It's uniquely exciting to be there."
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Tess is away from her family each Saturday during the period that Strictly is on TV, but was happy last year when Joe Sugg was booked onto the show as it made her two daughters Phoebe, 14, and Amber, ten, excited about their mum's job. She said: "Joe Sugg brought them back last year. They had a couple of years of like, 'Mum, don't make us watch again please. We've had it all our lives. But with Joe they were like, 'Oh okay mum, this is cool. Can we come and watch? We love Joe Sugg," she said.
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