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BBC puts spin on Dancing on Wheels
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Olympic swimmer Mark Foster, singer Heather Small and actress Michelle Gayle are among the celebs who have signed up for a new BBC dancing competition. Dancing on Wheels, which will appear on BBC Three this autumn, will pair up able-bodied celebrities with wheelchair users who have never danced before.
Together, they’ll attempt to master Wheelchair Dance Sport, in which at least one of the participants must be a wheelchair user. The winning couple will end up carrying the hopes of a nation, as they’ll go on to represent the UK at the sport’s European Championships in, er, Israel.
The six-part show will follow the usual Strictly Come Dancing format. The couples will train intensively each week before performing in front of a panel of judges, who’ll then decide which pair should be booted out of the competition. Strictly’s Brian Fortuna, a choreographer and ballroom pro who has been teaching wheelchair dancing for eight years, will mentor the couples.
The wheelchair users will include Simone, a 22-year-old Cambridge graduate; Diana, a 48-year-old magazine editor and mother; Carolyne, a 27-year-old “party girl”; and James, a 31-year-old whose acrobatics apparently “put most able-bodied people to shame”. That wouldn’t be hard in our case…
Danny Cohen, the controller of BBC Three, has said that the series will be “surprising, fun and glamorous”. He added that it “underlines our commitment to covering disability in a mainstream way, following the success of Britain’s Missing Top Model last year.”
We’re sure the programme will be wheely great (sorry). Personally, we’re glad to see anything on BBC Three that isn’t a repeat of Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps.
by Tom Murphy, Friday 29 May 2009
Sources: Press Association, BBC, The Sun
