Explore every episode of the podcast The ”Strictly Speaking” Podcast

We are back for our fifth year! As a new era of Strictly approaches, me and Poppy are back to reminisce on last year's final, and share our thoughts on the new celebrity lineup, the professionals who were not asked back, who we think each celebrity will be partnered with, and our ideas for Movie Week and Icon Week. 

We also discuss experiences at the Strictly Live Tour and the Professionals tour, share predictions for who could potentially do well in the competition, and discuss the interesting ways Strictly has decided to change some things this year...

Who are you rooting for this year?

Strictly Come Dancing premiers on Saturday 19th September on BBC One and iPlayer. Emma Willis, Josh Widdicombe and Johannes Radebe will take over from Tess Daly and Claudia Winkleman, and the judges are Craig Revel Horwood, Motsi Mabuse, Shirley Ballas and Anton Du Beke. 

Last year's series was won by Karen Carney and Carlos Gu, who beat George Clarke and Alexis Warr and Amber Davies and Nikita Kuzmin. 

The celebrities for this year include Lacey Turner, Dani Dyer, Delta Goodrem, Chris Appleton, Cach Mercer, Will Best, Dame Sarah Storey, Jaime Winstone, Bethany Antonia, Graeme Hall, Lawrence Robb, Tabby Stoecker, John Nellis and Melanie Walters. 

Strictly Come Dancing: It Takes Two will be hosted by Ellie Taylor, who is replacing Janette Manrara and Fleur East. 

The professionals not returning for this series are Karen Hauer, Gorka Marquez, Nadiya Bychkova, Luba Mushtuk and Michelle Tsiakkas. 

The returning professionals include Carlos Gu, Alexis Warr, Nikita Kuzmin, Julian Caillon, Katya Jones, Aljaz Skorjanec, Kai Widdrington, Vito Coppola, Lauren Oakley, Dianne Buswell, Jowita Przystał, Amy Dowden, Neil Jones, and Nancy Xu. 

They will be joined by new professionals Cristian Priori, Lothabo Monametsi, Mark Karmalita, Aleksandra Isaeva, and Maddie Ingoldsby. 

Movies mentioned: Wuthering Heights, The Devil Wears Prada 2, Inside Out, Tangled, Toy Story 5, Spider-Man, The Odyssey, Project Hail Mary, The Bride! 

Icons Mentioned: Dolly Parton, Bonnie Tyler, Julie Andrews, Elton John, Ella Fitzgerald, Shania Twain, Tina Turner, David Bowie, Amy Winehouse, Liza Minelli, Bob Marley, Kate Bush

That's it... we've made it to the end of the year...

Sorry this isn't a full episode of Strictly Speaking, but I just want to take the time to thank the listeners as well as give some quick thoughts on the FAB-U-LOUS final of Strictly Come Dancing 2025. Congratulations to the incredible winners Karen and Carlos, and to the amazing runners up George and Alexis and Amber and Nikita. Thank you to the cast of 2025 for making this series as "marvellous" as it was. 

Also, a big thank you to the legendary Tess and Claudia, we are very grateful that you made Strictly what it is over the last decade, the ballroom will not be the same without you, but we wish you the best of luck.

Again, thank you to everyone who has checked out Strictly Speaking this year, and hopefully we'll be back in 2026!

What a week that was...

After what is arguably Strictly's most shocking elimination of all time, Janet and Poppy are here to dissect this year's musical special. They talk about Lewis and Katya's unexpected exit from the competition, the incredible potential of the four semi finalists, and they get into a debate about whether The Greatest Showman is a movie or a musical.

Also, please remember that at the end of the day, this is all just a television show, and it is never okay to send hate to anyone. Even if you're upset about what happened this week, there's no need to drag others down.

Welcome to a very late edition of Strictly Speaking. Musical week has definitely not happened yet, so Janet and Poppy are going to talk about what is definitely the latest episode of Strictly, week 10.

They discuss Alex and Jojo's elimination and whether we think Jojo might be leaving Strictly, Balvinder's new dance off record, Karen and Amber's perfect dances and the absolute insanity of the new Instant Dance challenge. They also get into their "predictions" for Musicals week.

What a rollercoaster this week has been!

This week on Strictly Speaking, we discuss all about this year's trip to the Tower Ballroom, including Karen Carney's robbery of a perfect 40, Balvinder's dream come true, the returning celeb's dance, this year's Christmas contestants and Janet's scepticism towards the new 'instant dance' twist scheduled for week 10.

We also say an emotional goodbye to La Voix, who sadly had to withdraw from the competition due to injury, and we share our predictions for the upcoming dance off.

They're back! After a week off, Janet and Poppy are here to discuss weeks 7 & 8 of Strictly!

They talk about the dances from the last two weeks, the shocking eliminations of Harry and Vicky, La Voix's unfortunate withdrawal from Blackpool and the crazy trajectories that the other couples have had over these past two live shows.

They also give their final predictions for the much anticipated Blackpool show this week and who they think will be in the final (and seeing if they match up to who they think should be in the final!).

It's that time of year again! Time for Janet and Poppy to discuss the Strictly Come Dancing Halloween special!

In this episode, they discuss everything about Week 6 of Strictly, from the heart-breaking elimination of Ellie and Vito, to Lewis and Katya's perfect score, to Karen and Carlo's great comeback.

We also share our winner predictions, what we think about Shirley's criticism towards Amber and Janet talks about her experience seeing La Voix live this week.

Happy Halloween!

This week's episode of Strictly Speaking is a little different, since Janet and Poppy were not able to arrange a good time to speak to each other, so instead they recorded their thoughts on this week separately and then Janet spliced it together, but hopefully we should be back to normal next week.

This week was the first shocking elimination of the series, Jimmy and Lauren. Janet and Poppy would be lying if they said they weren't devastated. Janet also wanted to share her thoughts on certain opinions that other Strictly fans have shared online about George, Alex and Ellie, and Janet and Poppy give their predictions for the Halloween special that is happening... the day after Halloween...

To say this week has been chaotic and devastating in the Strictly Come Dancing cinematic universe would be a bit of an understatement.

In this episode of Strictly Speaking, we discuss all things Week 4, including the under marking of Karen and Amber, who we think will be in the final, and the questionable comments from Shirley to La Voix.

We also discuss the breaking news of Tess and Claudia's shocking announcement that they will be leaving the show after this series, and we share our suggestions for who could replace them...

There was also the very devastating news that Stefan has had to withdraw from the series due to injury, so we reflect on his performance from this past week and we address the absurd conspiracy theories about Dianne being the reason for his withdrawal.

Predicting 10s for Amber this week!

This week on Strictly Speaking, Janet and Poppy discuss one of Janet's personal Strictly favourites, Movie Week! Although Janet personally felt something was off this year, and has spent the last few days trying to figure out what was missing... or rather, who was missing...

We also discuss how George Clarke was done dirty by the producers with his Couple's Choice to Soda Pop, our predictions for the upcoming week 4, and we say an emotional goodbye to Janet's guilty pleasure couple, Ross and Jowita.

We're back, and we're here to discuss Week 2 of Strictly Come Dancing!

In this episode, we talk about the first elimination, what we thought of all the couples' dances, and our mixed opinions on the format change of the results show. We also send all our love to the wonderful Amy Dowden.

A lot has happened in the Strictly Come Dancing universe since we last spoke!

In this episode, we discuss the highs and lows of week 1 of Strictly. We talk about the surprises (both good and bad), Dianne's amazing baby news and how incredible she is, who we will be voting for this weekend and predictions for who could possibly be first out. 

We're kicking off our fourth series with our 2025 predictions! In less than a week's time, celebrities such as Alex Kingston, George Clarke, La Voix, Vicky Pattison and many others will take to the dance floor!

In this episode, we discuss last year's final, what we've been up to Strictly-wise in the past 9 months, which pros we think the celebrities will be partnered up with, and our ideas for movie week and how Strictly can improve certain aspects from last year.