Dancing Queen (From The Northern Echo)

Dancing Queen

4:21pm Thursday 29th December 2011 in Features By Steve Pratt

After 40 years as an actress, Anita Dobson was determined to learn how to hoof for Strictly Come Dancing. The results looked good and Dobson tells Steve Pratt about doing the Strictly tour to Newcastle before treading the boards again.

STRICTLY speaking, former EastEnders star Anita Dobson looked like the celebrity who most enjoyed her time on the dancefloor in the latest series.

While others became ultra-competitive (you know who you are, Jason), some attracted camp followers (Russell Grant) and others continued to doubt their ability (step forward, Chelsee), the woman known to millions of soap fans as boozed up Queen Vic landlady Angie Watts couldn’t keep the smile of enjoyment off her face (except in the tango, of course) as she embraced each new dance thrown at her.

She was never going to win the Strictly Come Dancing glitterball – and says her money was on McFly’s Harry Judd from day one – but that wasn’t the point. She wanted to learn to dance, something she’s always yearned to do.

She’ll continue her dancing dream on the Strictly Come Dancing Live tour, which comes to Newcastle’s MetroRadio Arena in February, before hanging up her dancing shoes and appearing on stage at Darlington Civic Theatre as Joan Crawford opposite Greta Scacchi’s Bette Davis in a new play.

No wonder she says people call her “have a go Dobson”. Acting was her first passion and now, she says, she has another – dancing. “Of course, it’s derivative of acting, it’s part and parcel of the entertainment industry,” she says.

She’s been waiting to dance all her life. “I was brought up watching Sunday afternoon matinees with all those Hollywood greats on the TV,” she recalls.

“I sat there crying buckets at those weepies. My mum would say, ‘why do you get so involved?’ and I’d say, ‘mum, you have to believe in it’. I’d watch all those Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire musicals, and me and my dad pretended we could tap dance around the room.

“I didn’t go to stage school, but did go to drama school where I did a tiny bit of singing and dancing but the main attention was on drama.”

She loved music, she loved dancing and singing but “somehow it never happened,” she says. “I was so intent on being a Shakespearean actress so that was what I was learning. I never came into contact with anyone who said take a year out and train as a dancer.

“People said you look as though you could dance. I never had any formal dance training, but it was something I gently hankered after. So it was always there and I was what was known as a good mover.”

AFTER nearly 40 years in the business, Dobson got her chance to trip the light fantastic thanks to Strictly. She’d been approached tentatively several times, but turned it down. Then her best friend asked what was stopping her having a go at something she longed to do.

“I said I was scared of making a fool of myself. But she said, ‘you’re 62, you don’t want to look back and regret you didn’t do it,” she says.

“It’s a reality show and a competition.

I’m not one who goes into competitive things or reality TV. But the lure of wanting to learn to dance was so strong.”

Partnered with professional dancer Robin Windsor – Team Dobbin, as they became known – she danced for nine weeks on the show before being eliminated in the public vote. The taking part more than the winning was what she enjoyed.

“I loved the training. It was the best bit. To get up every day and just learn a new dance every week was a pleasure,” she says.

“For me it was all about learning to dance and having some fun, enjoying the beautiful clothes and wearing the costumes.”

Age didn’t come into it, as she proved with the verve and energy she brought to each performance. “I’ve never lied about my age as an actress.

I’ve got parts and people have said you’re not old enough, so I’ve played parts much younger than me,” says Dobson.

“If you have the will, are healthy enough and it’s something you want to do, then carry on doing it.”

Dancing on tour will be different to weekly Strictly appearances. “As opposed to learning a different dance every week and performing it once in the studio, you’ll be doing the same couple of dances every night but in front of thousands of people. What a wonderful thing to do.”

The tour enables her to dance again with Windsor. She was partnered by Brendan Cole the week she was eliminated as Windsor was unable to dance because of an injury.

“It would be most disappointing not to have danced with my partner again,” she says. “I loved learning with Brendan, that was a huge gift and a bonus although it seemed strange.”

One person she won’t be dancing with is husband and Queen guitarist Brian May, although he was in the audience of the TV shows. He is “musical in his head” rather than his feet, she says. “He’s written me songs before and we’ve recorded together.

We talked about us doing something else together,” she adds.

The night before we spoke she’d been to see the musical Crazy For You on the London stage. “It was magical and beautiful,” she says. “It was emotional because people came up and said we loved watching you on Strictly. I felt a bit of a charlatan looking at those great dancers on stage to be considered part of their fraternity after such a short time.

“But Strictly has made me very confident about who I am and I understand if you put your mind to anything then you can do it.”

Unlike some other celebrity contestants, actors are able to “sell” a dance better than others on Strictly, she feels. “It doesn’t mean they are better on the steps but can sell the essentials of the dance very well. It’s like the tango, it’s easy to tap into the emotions but you can’t cheat on the steps,” she says.

THE glitz and sequins of the ballroom are a far cry from the gloom and doom of Albert Square where Dobson found fame as Angie Watts. She loved playing the Vic’s landlady as much as taking to the floor with Windsor.

But the time came to leave EastEnders when she followed her dad’s advice – if there’s something you want to do, go and do it. “It’s all part of my desperate desire to be an actress and that’s what’s driven me all my life,” she says.

The dancing will end after the arena tour and she returns to acting, coming to Darlington Civic Theatre in Bette And Joan, a head-to-head confrontation of two Hollywood divas – Davis and Crawford – on the set Whatever Happened To Baby Jane?, the movie that resurrected their careers.

“I’m going from something completely physical and nonspeaking like Strictly to a play where it’s non-physical and all about words with only two of us,” she says.

STRICTLY COME DANCING LIVE TOUR 2012

Joining Anita Dobson on the dancefloor are winner Harry Judd and runner-up, Chelsee Healy, plus Jason Donovan, Nancy Dell’Olio, Robbie Savage and Mark Foster.

The arena tour is directed by Craig Revel Horwood who, along with Len Goodman and Bruno Tonioli, will be on the judging panel.

Kate Thornton is the host.

• Newcastle MetroRadio Arena, Feb 7-9. Box office 0844- 4936666
• Bette And Joan: Darlington Civic Theatre, March 27-31.

Box office 01325-486555 and online darlingtonarts.co.uk