And to get a bit of Italian practice in....

Auguri per un felice 2017

[quote=LadyLavender;85010774]And to get a bit of Italian practice in....

Auguri per un felice 2017 [/QUOTEi

I am impressed! 😀

Grazie!

Off to get ready for NY Eve now.... wishing everyone a great evening.

Enjoy!

Happy New Year to everyone.

So much for Gio to look forward to in is professional life in 2017... the Strictly Tour, Donahey's weekends, dances to support charities, P&O Cruises, the Dance is Life Tour.. and then (fingers crossed) this year's Strictly.

I was very struck by Gio's comment in one of his recent radio interviews that what he wants most of all is to be known for his work as a professional dancer, not as a tabloid celebrity.

I hope that 2017 is a great year for him to focus on his dance career as he wants to do - and I am looking forward to lots of dance-related news to Appreciate.

OT Matthew Bourne's Sleeping Beauty this afternoon was an absolute treat - beautiful staging, fabulous dancing - what a glorious spectacle.

Hoping everyone has a happy first day of the New Year - a new page in a new book for us all to enjoy writing

Happy New Year everyone. Here's hoping for a great 2017 for Giovanni and all his fans

yes, please ........ and it would be great if Karen and Kevin could do a guest spot in Gio's show


and so do Emglish mothers ..... thanks for posting those pictures as I wouldn't have seen them otherwise


I'll second that ....... A Happy New Year to all in the Gio thread

Happy New Year everyone. I hope2017 is a good one for you all.

Gio certainly has plenty of exciting projects lined up. I hope he gets his wish and it is his wonderful dancing that dominates 2017.

Last year must have been a huge learning curve for him. He now knows how our tabloid press operate. I suspect from now on he will control how much access they get to his private life.

I am looking forward to the Strictly Tour. With a team of the known Strictly professional dancers in the tour without celeb partners I am hoping we are treated to some real dancing which will showcase their true skills that they have trained so long to master. It is the 10th anniversary of the tour so I have high hopes for this one.

I am pretty sure it goes without saying his own tour will showcase his amazing dancing so I am really looking forward to that too.

Can't wait to hear news of Gio's various projects on here. I hope he finds success in everything he does in 2017. He certainly deserves it.

Here's hoping 2017's book is filled with positivity for him.

Well he was in control last year as he was placing all the pictures of himself, and Georgia he's not naïve, no one forced him to place them on Instagram. Most of the pro's do it who are in relationships Alijaz and Janette, Jo, Gorka when he was engaged.
I even know who Anton's partner is

When he is a relationship again I except he will do similar to when he was with Georgia because that's what people his age do. Does not mean that he is a tabloid celebrity or less of a dancer.

It must be this week that everyone returns for the tour rehearsals. I think it was about 5th last year.

I wonder if Gio did get on that plane he tweeted then deleted almost immediately. I was a bit puzzled that he was leaving Italy just before New Year. One theory I had was that he might have been going to Oti's wedding which took place last night. I have no idea where she was getting married. Jeanette tweeted about it.

To be honest, I think Gio was fairly naive last year about many things including how the press operate in the UK. He cut down significantly how much he posted on social media (outside of professional stuff) after around the middle of last year.

I was struck by how forcefully he said that he does not want to be known as a television/tabloid celebrity, but simply as a professional dancer. Since September in particular, it is fairly obvious that his press and social media has kept pretty much just to his professional life. So that is quite a big change. He clearly is very, very passionate about continuing to work on Strictly and, for what it's worth, the Strictly producers are against professional dancers who try to become bigger than the show (James and Ola Jordan spring to mind here). Gio would be smart to keep his focus on his dance career in 2017 - let's see how he plays it.

Janette does use social media extensively, but she is quite careful to stay on message - positive stuff about family, dance, healthy lifestyles and that sort of thing. Nothing that conflicts with Strictly's family audience. She has probably got the balance right. Kevin, Pasha, Brendan, Anton and, actually, Alijaz don't put that much out there outside the odd professional snippet. AJ and Neil Jones are at the other end of the scale.

Nothing directly to do with Gio but I felt : this was a coincidence that had to be mentioned. Luba is in NY with her family and she met Greg Rutherford.

https://twitter.com/lubamushtuk/stat...15134328586240

Given the size of NY this is amazing. I apologise for going off topic.

Happy New Year Ruby - Wouldn't that be fantastic... they will already have done their own show in Grimsby earlier in the year, is there such a thing as Too Much Kevin

I just saw that and couldn't believe it either - amazing coincidence.

I think Gio headed back to UK for a NY Eve social event of some sort .. just keeping his social life low key again. I wondered if Gio would make a quick trip to Miami - Janette's mother posted a comment about seeing him soon - but who knows.

Tour rehearsals might kick off on the 8th or thereabouts I guess. Doesn't time move quickly.

I missed the bit re Jeanette's mum. I actually wondered if he would fly to NewYork to meet up wit Luba and her family but I guess that was purely a family occasion.

.I always feel a bit sorry for the pros/celebs once they arrive in Birmingham to rehearse as they are very much under the spotlight. Imagine coming out of a exhausting day of rehearsals to find press cameras. I know on one level they need the publicity but if you are not looking your best you do not want your photo in the tabloids.

Some of this I agree with some I don't. . You use Janette as an example but she has posted from New Year loads of family pictures. As does AJ, he posted loads of pictures with Claudia when Strictly was on nothing since. I would say those were professional pictures because that was work.

If he wants to be known as just a professional dancer then he is on the wrong show, because the pro's become celebs once people get to know about them and that's when the press are interested in them to. I agree that his Instagram has some professional stuff but also much of it is just modelling pictures nothing to do with dancing at all. I don't think he really makes much diffidence to the producers as long as you do your job. Gio had quite a lot of negative press, not all his fault but if he wants to be successful again on Strictly he needs a good partnership with whoever he gets this year.

I agree with the points you made LadyLavender. Gio is certainly going in the right direction at the moment. Less is more in my book and not just in the beard department😀. That way the focus is on his professional life. It is probably a bit easier for the people in long term relationships as the tabloids do not have the same interest unless of course you break up but if you are single it can't be easy.

I think all the pros accept there is going to be some attention from the press. However I can't believe the producers are happy with the nasty negative publicity Gio had this year. They work hard to give Strictly a positive image.

More unfortunate circumstance really I think and the producers giving him a partner to get headlines.

Chris - Janette absolutely does post family pictures I agree - but what I was getting at is that she is careful e.g. no-one is ever smoking, that sort of thing. So.. it is the 'wholesome' sort of family life. Neices and nephews at the Disney store.. that sort of thing. Nothing wrong with that at all. AJ sticks a lot of his life on Instagram Stories and Snapchat.. his new year looked fairly epic, shall we say.

The pro dancers are part of the biggest show on UK television for four months of the year so yes - they become well known. And the producers place restrictions on what the pro dancers can do e.g. commercial endorsements, no social media posting about politics or religion, no swearing, no saucy calendars / racy photoshoots etc. So the producers are concerned about image and reputation - it matters because the show is positioned as family entertainment.


Can't be easy at all. Gio has kept his personal life out of the press since August so has done well in that respect. I expect Laura will be doing quite a bit of press in January to promote her Peter James play. She is going to get a few questions about Strictly so it is great that she is clearly happy to speak positively about working with Gio - I watched the Alan Carr show (with a LOT of fast forward - most of it isn't my cup of tea despite lovely Greg Rutherford) and thought what Laura said was just fine - he was a good teacher, they spent a lot of time together and they are on friendly terms. That'll do nicely

I couldn't agree more that the very best thing for Gio would be a successful partnership on the show next year - and a break from all the red-top headlines.

His partnership with Laura is not really relevant here as that partnership is at an end. This thread is dedicated to Gio and his many new exciting projects he has planned for 2017. We appreciate his fantastic dancing and are now looking forward to the coming year. His hope and ours is that his dancing is the focus of attention. Nothing else.

The version of the story I heard (from elsewhere) was that the producers wanted to give Brendan a shot at the finals (recreating the Anton and Katie Derham storyline from last year). So they swapped Laura, who potentially would have been paired with Brendan, for Anastacia, who appeared to have more potential both in dance ability and fan base. The consequence was Laura and Gio as a pairing - but I kind of agree that the producers didn't mind the prospect of a bit of 'showmance' speculation.

Happy New Year everyone.

Definitely an exciting year ahead for Gio

I think the pairing with Laura is still relevant from the dance point of view but as Laura is not on the tour but starting rehearsals for her play.. probably not that much more will crop up.

OT the definite downside of following people on Instagram is all the pictures of exotic locations filled with sunshine...... very envy-inducing.

It was obvious that the pairings were a bit odd this year. So many mismatched size wise.
On this occasion it was a 'showmance' with an extra twist the producers couldn't resist. This backfired on many levels. They did not get the storylines they hoped for but that is in the past. Time to move on.