Now that you mention it, it was a lobster costume.

Just caught up with this interview on iPlayer . Ola seems to be in a great place right now, really cheerful and unstressed. Ashley should be very encouraged by that.

I remember the first couple of series she was in, she never smiled once, sulked all the time. Then suddenly, she must have got a partner she liked, and the smile came out !

Hope she doesn't suffer for her candid comments in the interview, I thought she was lovely.

Ola sulking in series 2. (To be fair - it was a long time ago).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zr3A6rgSb_c

Bit more from Series 2. Spoony could dance, but you can see he was temperamental and he also had to learn to cope with being 'in heat' around Ola.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RE2Z4w5FNbw

Good post

Two words: bicycle paso.

I guess he knows which side his bread is buttered and does what he is told accordingly

He - and Anton - are in their 11th series.
I imagine that a fair few dancing principles have been jettisoned over the years for them to still be there.

I agree thought she was determined to set the record straight coz it was a daft theme. Do the pros have any autonomy in actual fact?

Haha I forgot about that. Oh that was excrutiating. He must have been gifted Sophie this year as compensation

I've been wondering this more and more this series. I'm sure there's always been an element of control, but it seems much more apparent now. I'm sure Ian said (many many series ago) that the pros used to give a list of their preferred music for each dance to the producers and then they were told which they could use (to avoid clashes, mainly, e.g. apparently there was quite a scramble over who got to use 'Mercy' by Duffy ~ Ola won that one, if I recall correctly )

But now a few comments from pros/celebs have seemed to suggest that it now works the other way, and the pros are given their music by the producers, e.g. Mark's reference to Iveta doing the best she could to choreograph a rhumba to Goldfinger, having been 'given' the music/theme.

Its a shame if the pros are increasingly becoming puppets rather than being allowed to showcase their talent and creativity.

In one of the ITT's from much earlier days, they said the celebs were asked for a list of their favourite music - thinking being someone stands a chance of dancing well and connecting more if they actually know and like the track.

I thought her comment was quite restrained - 03:50

Here she is in Estuarine: [I'm impressed how she has picked up the local accent and she must have a great musical ear]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode...11_Episode_40/

"It is sor' of not sometimes our choice of wo' we do, so when ... when the producers and the team tell us 'we would like you to do a cowboy theme' we just go wi' i' and I do the best I possibly can with the music and song ... but I was a li'l bit disappointed with tha' but apart from tha' i' was perfeck ... "

I too love to listen to her. She really cracks me up

I am always impressed at the pros grasp of English anyway, they manage some very idiomatic English , I have noticed Alaz English improve a lot over the course of the show