It’s now been a decade since Tess Daly and Claudia Winkleman hosted their first season of Strictly Come Dancing together.
First fronting the beloved BBC series in 2014, they were paired up following the departure of Bruce Forsyth, who had been hosting with Tess since the show premiered in 2004.
Viewers were drawn to the two presenters and off-screen, they also became firm friends.
That was despite claims that the pair ‘despised’ each other, which some commentators suggesting they believed there was a ‘feud’ brewing.
However, over the years Tess, 55, and Claudia, 52, have made it clear just how well they get along.
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Before we next see them on screens again, with the first live show of the 20th anniversary season kicking off tonight, here’s everything we know about the friendship between the two Strictly mainstays.
How did Claudia Winkleman and Tess Daly meet?
While Tess first started presented on Strictly the year it premiered 20 years ago now, Claudia gained public recognition presenting spin-off series, Strictly Come Dancing: It Takes Two, from 2004 too.
When asked details of their first meeting, Claudia once recalled: ‘It must have been on It Takes Two a hundred years ago. Tess had just had her little girl Phoebe and we started talking about our kids straight away – Tess is so in love with her children! And so beautiful!’
However, Tess revealed they’d met years earlier.
‘We met in our local chemists about 11 years ago. It was her first trip out with her new baby Jake and she was struggling to negotiate the buggy. I held the door for her and we had a little chat,’ she told Radio Times in 2015.
When did they start working together?
In 2010, Claudia became co-host of the Sunday night results show of Strictly Come Dancing, presenting alongside Tess.
It was four years later that her role expanded to presenting the main show.
Tess once told Express that presenting the show with Claudia didn’t feel like work and was instead ‘an extension of our friendship’.
‘It always felt natural and right [to work with her] and, when you genuinely get on with someone, it is a joy to stand next to them on the floor,’ she said.
What have they said about each other?
The pair made history a decade ago when being announced as primetime TV’s first female presenting duo.
Ahead of their first Strictly episode hitting screens, Tess spoke about the significance of their casting.
‘I know – two women hosting the biggest show on TV! And in our 40s… Surprise, surprise, we’re not past our sell-by date,’ she quipped.
‘It’s a huge compliment that the BBC has broken the traditional male/ female hosting format, and all credit to them for being the first to do it,’ she added.
Although Tess admitted she was going to miss working with Bruce, she was thoroughly enjoying working alongside Claudia.
‘After 10 years it’s a big change. But hand on heart, we are having a blast! Claudia is so much fun. She is a career woman but, like me, a mum first and foremost. She is incredibly talented and things she says off the cuff are hysterical,’ she shared.
The following year Claudia gave an insight into their friendship and working relationship, revealing they would eat McDonald’s on the dressing room floor together after filming wrapped.
‘It’s all very fabulous for everyone else, but as soon as the show is over, Tess and I sit on the floor inhaling Maltesers and eating McDonald’s,’ she told Radio Times.
Speaking about her relationship with her co-host, she also shut down speculation things might be tense once cameras stopped rolling.
‘Tess and I get on brilliantly. I’ve always thought viewers know what’s real and what isn’t. Fakery and nonsense can be seen from miles off,’ she explained.
When Strictly airs at the tail end of the year, each weekend the pair also share photos together backstage ahead of each episode.
Strictly Come Dancing continues tonight at 7pm on BBC One.
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