Strictly Come Dancing 2024

Tess Daly hid her pregnancy from BBC show bosses (Image: BBC)

Strictly Come Dancing presenter Tess Daly has been at the helm of the BBC show alongside co-star Claudia Winkleman since its inception in 2004 – however, she once thought that she would be sacked before she even had her foot in the door properly for a very sad reason.

Speaking on Giovanna Fletcher’s podcast, Happy Mum Happy Baby, the 56-year-old presenter shared that when she first accepted the job she had just found out that she was pregnant with her daughter, Phoebe, who she shares with famous husband Vernon Kay. Tess shared: “I remember when I first got the job on Strictly, and I remember I was pregnant — I was newly pregnant with Phoebe — and I didn’t tell them that I was pregnant because I thought ‘they might not give me the job.’ I also thought, ‘it’s early on, before you tell anyone.'”

 

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Tess and Vernon have two daughters together (Image: Getty Images for the NTA’s)

The TV host added that the pregnancy was so early that even her family were not aware yet, as she continued: “I’d not even told my own mother yet.

“It was sort of eight or nine weeks, you know, that phase before you tell anyone because you want to be sure, and you tell them at 12 weeks.

“So, I didn’t tell them. I thought, ‘well, I’m not going to tell them before I tell my own mother.’ It doesn’t affect my ability to do my job.

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The presenter is still on the BBC show 20 years later (Image: Getty)

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“You know, at the back of my mind, I did think ‘what if they didn’t want me because they don’t want a visibly pregnant woman on a primetime show on Saturday night?’ Of which, in 2004, you didn’t see many pregnant women on Saturday night shows.”

Tess and Vernon Kay first met 25 years ago when they were tasked with recreating their own dance to Britney Spears’ …Baby One More Time during a BBC Christmas party.

A couple of years after they first met, the celebrity duo tied the knot. They later went on to welcome two daughters, Phoebe and Amber.