Claudia Winkleman ignored her children’s pleas to quit “embarrassing” ‘Strictly Come Dancing’;
Claudia Winkleman ignored her son's plea to leave Strictly
The 51-year-old television presenter shot back at her son Jake, now 21, -who along with daughter Matilda, 17, and Arthur, 12, she has with her film producer husband Kris Thykier, 51 - when he asked her to “stop doing” the star-studded BBC One Latin and ballroom dancing competition that it paid for everything he did.
She said while appearing at the Edinburgh TV Festival: “He said to me, ‘Mum, you have got to stop doing 'Strictly, it’s so embarrassing and my teacher has mentioned it’. I just went ‘See those trainers, Jake?’ He was like ‘OK, sorry’.
“My only job is to make sure [the celebs] are OK and to stop speaking on time. I know I’m not allowed to say I just paint myself orange and I read out loud but really that is what I do most of the time. So, that’s the gig but it’s really, really thrilling.”
Claudia played modest with her presenting style as she believes the string of programmes she currently hosts are “so strong” they would be hits without her.
She said: “‘The Traitors’ and ‘Strictly’ and ‘The Piano’ are so strong anybody could host them. We all know it. But I’m lucky enough that I’m there. That is the truth. It doesn’t mean I’m not unbelievably grateful, but it’s just as luck would have it I’ve fallen into them.”
The BBC Radio 2 DJ shared the advice her parents, the publishing giant Barry Winkleman, 84, and ex-Daily Mirror editor Eve Pollard, 79, gave her when it came to the world of work.
Claudia said: “My dad worked in publishing and he always said you had to be the first one there and the last one to leave. And you always have to make the tea, whoever you are. He just said to work incredibly hard and don’t be a turd, basically. It’s not bad advice.
“My mum didn’t want me to do what she did. She said it was really hard for a woman. She used to come home and put us to bed on a Saturday and then go back to the paper. She’d tell [me and my brother Oliver], ‘If you need me, any time, you’ll get through [on the phone]. It doesn’t matter who I’m with, which proprietor or politician or whatever, you will find me’. But it was hard for her.”
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