omedian, actor and presenter Les Dennis has been revealed as the ultimate movie star contestant to hit the dancefloor on this 12 months’s Strictly Come Dancing competitors.

The 69-year-old has had a profession within the leisure business spanning 5 a long time, turning into a stalwart of Saturday evening TV starring in comedies together with The Les Dennis Laughter Show and The Russ Abbot Show, and most famously because the host of ITV’s well-liked recreation present Family Fortunes from 1987 till 2002.

He is each a star of the display and the stage, showing on ITV cleaning soap Coronation Street as Michael Rodwell from 2014 to 2016, in addition to in hit performs and musicals on the West End, together with Hairspray, Legally Blonde, Only Fools And Horses The Musical, Chicago and The Addams Family.

Appearing on ITV’s Good Morning Britain to disclose himself because the fifteenth and closing Strictly contestant, he stated: “I had a knee replacement two years ago and I remember thinking to myself, ‘it may be time to slow down’, but you get something offered like this and it puts a spring in your step.

Read More

“I’m excited and I’m terrified. People at any age can do anything.”

The common age of contestants on this 12 months’s collection is 42 – the best since 2017 and near the best within the present’s historical past, which was 45 in 2010.

Dennis additionally stated he was requested to seem within the present whereas he was starring in Coronation Street and stated he by chance leaked the news on Twitter forward of the announcement on Friday.

He stated: “What happened was the Strictly producers ask you to send a playlist of songs you might like, so I tried to and I’m totally hopeless at social media and all that stuff.

“So my daughter put my playlist together and put ‘Strictly Les Dennis’ and I sent it to my agent by email, but must have done a fat finger mistake and pressed Twitter by mistake.

“I was asked once when I was in Corrie, but when you’re in Corrie you can’t do it, you can only do it when you come out, and Ellie Leach of course she’s doing it.”

Dennis stated he will likely be on tour with the musical forty second Street “so whoever I partner has to come with me”, coaching all day for Strictly and “dancing all night” within the theatre present forward of his seventieth birthday in October.

He has additionally starred with the Royal Shakespeare Company and the English National Opera throughout his profession.

Born in Liverpool, Dennis has been married 3 times, most famously to Britain’s Got Talent choose Amanda Holden in 1995 earlier than splitting in 2002.

His different TV credit embrace Celebrity Big Brother, Casualty, Merseybeat, Hotel Babylon and Birds Of A Feather, in addition to Extras, Brookside, Death In Paradise and Midsomer Murders.

Dennis will be a part of cleaning soap stars previous and current on the dancefloor, together with former Coronation Street star Ellie Leach, EastEnders actor Bobby Brazier, former EastEnders star Nigel Harman and Waterloo Road star Adam Thomas.

The Strictly line-up additionally contains Paralympic champion Jody Cundy and former British primary tennis participant Annabel Croft in addition to BBC Asian Network’s Breakfast Show host Nikita Kanda, actress Amanda Abbington, Bad Education star Layton Williams and broadcaster Angela Rippon.

They will likely be joined by journalist Krishnan Guru-Murthy, comic Eddie Kadi, Irish TV presenter Angela Scanlon and former Love Island star Zara McDermott.

Presenters Tess Daly and Claudia Winkleman will likely be again to host the present when it returns to screens within the autumn, alongside judges Shirley Ballas, Craig Revel Horwood, Motsi Mabuse, and Anton Du Beke.