At the Pallladium is the dance spectacular that every Strictly Come Dancing  fan has been waiting for but I’ll bring you the view of someone for whom the world of Strictly has had less impact ……so far!  This conversion is to do with the sheer enjoyability of this show and the professionalism and skill of the dancers.  This is down to the choreographer and director Gareth Williams who was an assistant director on the Olympic Closing ceremony in 2012. 

The star of the show is relatively new dancer to Strictly, Sicilian, Graziano di Prima whose handsome looks, height and constantly flicked back, wet look long curls are eye candy for the audience.  His strength is Latin dance as he has won the Latin championship at home in Italy.  His Ballroom may lack precision but his Latin has all the dramatic sexual content. The other favourite is Aljaž Škorjanec, who has been on Strictly for seven years and whose facial acting is a bonus addition to his perfect steps.

Veteran of Strictly Robin Windsor has great stage dance experience and Rachel Riley’s husband, Pasha Kovalev (is he really 5 feet 11 ? ~ Wikipedia) has his own fan base.  Maybe I am being heightist about this but height is more noticeable on stage than it is on television.  In the audience were AJ Pritchard and his diminutive girlfriend Abbie Quinnen, a really cute couple.  You can understand the number of romances in the dance world with professional dance’s sex on legs reputation. 

Nadiya Bychkova is the headline girl dancer and during this show she will dance six back to back numbers, most often partnered by Aljaž with whom, as a little girl,  she trained at the same dance school in Slovenia.  Two more young male dancers, George Michealides and Mick Scott join group numbers  and individually will demonstrate exciting and acrobatic flik flaks.   Graziano’s fiancée (sad face) Giada Lini will join three other girls, Ash-Leigh Hunter, Grace Cinque-White and Rose Wild to do what the men do backwards and in high heels!

The show is compered by Bass6 a beat boxer and Karim Zeroual, an actor and Strictly runner up as a contestant in 2019.  The audience vote on Battles by the top four men and even as a novice dance fan I could predict the winner of each genre of dance style. The music is recorded but the tunes are great, from 1950s Jive to Los Lobos, Prince, Lady Gaga and Irving Berlin. 

I remember a theatre director saying that what you remember on stage is the visual and of course dance transcends spoken language barriers.  Here Come the Boys! is a visual kaleidoscope with costume changes and spectacular lighting effects.  The psychedelic back projections add excitement.