The two-time Strictly Come Dancing champion Oti Mabuse had an exhausting Christmas. Having just recovered from the superflu, she and her husband, the Romanian former dancer Marius Iepure, hosted at their Berkshire village home, where guests included Mabuse’s sisters, Phemelo, 40, the CEO of a Belgian company that makes wind turbines, and Motsi, 44, a judge on UK Strictly, as well as partners and many children — the youngest being the couple’s two-year-old daughter.
“Motsi was, like, ‘Guys, I’ve just done the Strictly final. Leave me out of this. I want to sit with a glass of champagne and do nothing,’” says Mabuse, 35. “So we did it all and it was great but now I feel like I need a holiday. It’s the dishes! You see a mountain, the kids are asking for dessert and you’re thinking, ‘And now I have to do breakfast tomorrow.’”
She has decided that next year they’ll revert to the norm of descending on their parents in Pretoria, South Africa. “Mum’s always like, ‘If you don’t come home for Christmas, it’s not Christmas.’ Well, you want it, you get it! You take that mental load.”
Oti and Motsi Mabuse at the 2023 Bafta Television Awards
KATE GREEN/BAFTA/GETTY IMAGES FOR BAFTA
Her mother, Dudu, a primary school head teacher, is 71 (her 75-year-old father, Peter, is a judge). Is it fair to lump it all on them? “Well, in South Africa it’s very different. We have helpers in the house. When I say that in the UK it sounds a bit posh and unrelatable but it’s a completely different culture there.”
It’s understandable Mabuse wants a break. Since she quit Strictly at the end of 2021 to explore myriad opportunities coming her way, she has been very busy. She has become a mother (her daughter was eight weeks premature and had to spend six weeks in neonatal intensive care, but all is now well). She has also established her own dance school, appeared nonstop on television, doing everything from judging The Masked Dancer and Dancing on Ice to going into the jungle for I’m a Celebrity, becoming a regular Loose Women panellist, presenting a documentary about South Africa and choreographing various musicals. She has also recently published a steamy novel, Slow Burn.
“My husband picked it up and his face turned pink! Motsi called me when she’d read a snippet and said, ‘What have you written? I’m sweating!’ My mum looked at it and said, ‘This isn’t the Bible.’”
After so much productivity, Mabuse’s plan for the past year had been to slow down. “My goal was contentment, because I feel sometimes we’re always chasing the next thing. I wanted to be in the moment — whatever came, came. I had my family and friends and I wanted that to be enough. I was in a really happy place in my life.”
And then came a call asking Mabuse to be head judge on Ireland’s Strictly equivalent, Dancing with the Stars. “I don’t think I’ve ever screamed so loudly in my life.”
Now she’s spending every weekend in Dublin. We’re talking in a central London PR office, where —wheelie bags parked in the corner — she’s come straight from Heathrow, having just filmed the first episode. “And had two hours’ sleep,” she says cheerfully.
With, from left, Brian Redmond, Karen Byrne and Arthur Gourounlian for Dancing with the Stars
Did she ask Motsi, who has now been judging Strictly for six years, for tips? “I did!” Mabuse starts reading her sister’s texts to me. “‘Good luck. You will be amazing. Don’t be anything except yourself. Be real and honest. Speak from your heart, and don’t try to prove anything. Just go with the intention of having fun.’” She has followed those directions diligently. “I’m having the best time, it’s been so joyous. Although yesterday I thought, how am I going to deal with this? Because everyone in Ireland is loud, but when I’m excited I get really squeaky. In my head” — she lowers her voice — “I was talking like this, then I watched it back, I was like …” Mabuse’s pitch reaches helium levels. “Oh well, it is what it is.”
An ever bigger job could be beckoning. Now that Tess Daly and Claudia Winkleman have stepped down after 11 years jointly presenting UK Strictly, there are vacancies for two of the biggest roles in British television. Mabuse has to be in the running. “I can’t!” she exclaims, blushing. “I’m here. I love Dancing with the Stars.”
Hmm, Dancing with the Stars will be long over by the time Strictly starts its 2026 season. The former judge and renowned choreographer Arlene Phillips has named Mabuse as a definite contender to present, praising her work ethic and “amazing personality”. “Arlene? Really? Oh my God, why is Arlene doing this? I don’t know what’s happening. I don’t know where they’re at. But genuinely I feel spiritually in Ireland. Whatever happens, happens.”
After a couple of scandal-fuelled years packed with allegations of bullying by professionals and someone involved with the show being arrested on rape charges, does she think Strictly can weather the loss of Daley and Winkleman?
“I love Strictly. I wouldn’t be sitting here without that show. Strictly belongs to the people, and as long as the people still love it, it will go on for years. Claudia and Tess are … I get emotional when I talk about it, because they are just so brilliant. Nobody really sees the work Tess has to do — that show’s live, she’s making sure it’s not running over. Now I’m a judge I appreciate the job even more because I can talk for days, I can hear the producers in my ear saying, ‘Make it snappy!’ Then Claudia’s amazing … her wit, her humour. But we’ve lost judges, we’ve lost pros, we’ve lost producers and the show is just itself. I think it will survive and thrive. And I think anyone who gets asked to do that job is so lucky and will do it splendidly, the producers will do a good job [choosing] because they know that show better than any of us.”
Mabuse won Strictly Come Dancing with Bill Bailey in 2020
GUY LEVY/BBC
One of only two professionals to win the show twice (with Kelvin Fletcher and Bill Bailey) and the only one to do it consecutively, over a seven-year stint, Mabuse has often spoken about the challenges of being a “plus-size” dancer, a term that seems ludicrous applied to the tiny creature sitting besides me wrapped in blankets, but which — apparently — is accurate in the dance world.
“There’s a specific way they expect a dancer to look. And I’ve always been curvy with bigger boobs. I’m African. My ancestors are curvy. When you’re an athlete with a bigger chest it’s so difficult. But once I came to terms with it when I was dancing, being different felt like my superpower. It helped me stick out and now I try to spread positivity to girls who might feel held back by their body shape.”
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Before reaching this point, Mabuse tried every fad diet going, as well as gimmicks such as training in plastic trousers to help her sweat off the pounds. Now she’s relying on a simpler method — the app MyFitnessPal, which tracks exercise taken versus calories consumed.
“You just log what you eat,” she explains, showing me her phone, where she has diligently listed the likes of “gin and tonic”, “sushi”, “tangerine” — some of the things she ate on Christmas Day. “Or you can just take a picture of what you’ve eaten and then it tells you how many more calories you have remaining that day, depending on your goals — if you want to lose weight or gain it, or get stronger. For me, it’s not so much about dieting because as a working mum I’m living a different life now. It’s about making sure I’m eating the right food and moving. There are no tricks, no quick steps — we’ve all tried those when to fix a long-term resolution you actually have to take things very slowly.”
Even more conflicting for Mabuse is the fact that in South Africa standards are completely different. “You get the same critique for being skinny there you get for being plus-size here — it’s an Olympic sport. As a people we’re so brutally honest. The conversation at home could be quite toxic. It started when the first granddaughter was born, she’s nine now. Everybody was like, ‘Oh, the baby’s very chubby!’ I had to say to my family, ‘I don’t like that. I am finding certain conversations really difficult and could you please not use language about weight in front of the children, because they need a safe haven.’ Now the older generation’s got better and it’s done wonders for us all.”
The remarkable Mabuse sisters (Phemelo, she says, is the best dancer of the lot) grew up in the early days of post-apartheid in a township “full of drugs and violence”. Mabuse’s brother, Neo, died by suicide aged 16 (Mabuse was two at the time). Determined to keep her three daughters out of trouble, Dudu established a local dancing school they all attended. “As a family we tried our best. Dancing was our way out.”
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Nonetheless, dancing was not remotely considered a career. Mabuse’s ambitious parents insisted she take a civil engineering degree and were horrified when — as the eight-time South African Latin champion — halfway through her course she dropped out, travelling to Germany, where Motsi was already living, and announcing she was becoming a professional dancer. “They were worried and fearful and I get it — it was risky. Motsi wasn’t the superstar she is today — those kinds of things didn’t happen to people like us. They still worry but they’re also so proud. My dad is like, ‘You guys are actually living your dreams overseas, you’re really taking care of your families.’”
Iepure was her professional dance partner, they married 11 years ago and — after Strictly scouted her — settled in the UK in 2015, where they think they’ll stay forever. Their daughter, she says laughing, “is very British.” Will Mabuse be a tiger mother, like Dudu? “A friendly tiger. I want boundaries but I don’t understand when people say, ‘Your child is not your best friend.’ I want us to be obsessed with each other, I want her to say, ‘My mum’s my life.’”
Oti Mabuse’s perfect weekend
Strictly or Traitors? Oh no, two Claudia shows! I love Traitors — but Strictly
Dry January or damp January? Dry January
Gym session or country walk? Walks, but I get more tired at the gym
Dressing up or dressing gown? Dressing gown
Tiger mum or free-range parent? I’m a hybrid — a bear, a mama bear
Last thing you googled? Swimming lessons for the baby, she starts today
Couldn’t get through the weekend without…. My husband
For more information, see myfitnesspal.com