17 March 2023 , 19:01
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Craig Revel Horwood can’t wait to turn 60 and has no intention of retiring from Strictly Come Dancing.
The 58-year-old judge insists he is ready to embrace life after landmark age.
He plans to continue to work in the theatre and sit on the judging panel of the BBC One ballroom show, which he has been a part of for almost 20 years.
He said: “It’s only one year to my 60th year, I’m going to make the most of that, I tell you. I’m embracing it, I’ve been looking forward to it.”
Craig is the only remaining judge from when Strictly began in 2004 when he sat on the panel with Len Goodman, Bruno Tonioli and Arlene Phillips.
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Craig in his role as a Strictly judge (BBC)When Craig, was working as a dancer he had planned on retiring at 50, but outside Strictly, he has kept working in theatre as a director and choreographer
He told the How to be 60 podcast: “I’d set up a plan to retire at exactly 50 from when I was 25.
“I was doing Miss Saigon, or something, in the West End. I thought ‘I’m going to set up my retirement because I don’t want to be doing this for the rest of my life’. I went to the people who arranged it for starving actors, I could only afford £126 a month to put into it.
Craig alongside fellow judges Anton du Beke, Shirley Ballas and Motsi Mabuse (BBC/Ray Burmiston)“But I still haven’t retired. I was looking forward to old age. I was looking forward to getting fat, to not having to diet or do exercise or dance any more.
“As much as I love dance, when you’ve done it for a living it’s the last thing you want to do at parties. Dancing is a really difficult profession and a hard life.
“Like sports people it becomes quite tiring by the time you’re 30 and you’re up against 16 and 17-year-olds and their legs are going higher, faster and stronger.
“I felt like their father and thought, ‘this is crazy.’ And that sets you off onto the path of, OK, what do you do next after the body fails?
“It was failing, I had shoulder injuries. You know it’s the end of your career and you have to consider, what am I going to do? But I remained, luckily, in the dance world and for the last 20 years as a judge. That’s quite nice because I just get to sit and hold panels from one to 10, or one to four as most people think!
“There is no way that I could retire.”