91Èȱ¬

Graham Norton

Graham Norton has spent the last couple of months watching people dance. They've been tap dancing, doing the tango, body-popping, dancing the salsa - you name it, he's seen it.

But the host of Strictly Dance Fever is hiding a guilty secret… he can't dance to save his life.

"They have asked me to do some dancing and, so as not to appear difficult, I said 'Of course, I'd love to'. But, come the night, I don't think you'll be seeing a lot of dancing from Graham - I think it'll all be cut," laughs the presenter, who is set to become the new king of Saturday night TV.

Does he have any dance experience at all?

"Well… drunken dancing! I've had to learn a little bit of dancing for the show. We did a line dance.

"I do love dancing and it's one of those things I wish I could do.

"When you're filming it, it's much easier to fake than singing - it's very hard to fake singing, whereas if they just use cutaways of your hand doing that," he says, doing his best John Travolta pose, "they can just put my hand in when everyone else's hand is doing that!"

Graham even managed to avoid dancing when he was at drama school, long before he found fame as a comedian and then as the host of his award-winning Channel 4 series, So Graham Norton.

"We did do some dancing… well, it seemed more like movement to me. I did have tap shoes but I think I lost them!

"I can do a thing where you do this..," he says, tapping his feet noisily on the floor, "but you're quite right, that did just seem like I was just hitting my feet at the ground!

"I'd love to be able to do pop routines, like Britney, but it's so hard. I don't try - I just watch.

"At home, it never strikes me that I could do it, but when you're in a room and people are learning how to do it, you kind of think, 'Ooh, I wonder if I could learn how to do that,' but I know I couldn't.

"Or it would take me days and weeks to learn the 30-second routine that the people on the show are able to pick up."

It seems as if the whole nation has gone dance crazy since Strictly Come Dancing hit the screens a year ago.

Two celebrity-packed series later, not to mention an ice dancing Christmas special, it's now time for the public to strut their stuff and show off their dancing skills.

"There's something about watching people learn how to dance," says Graham.

"If it's just presented as a kind of fait accompli, you just think yeah, whatever, but if you see the process that goes into all the incredible hard work, and literally blood, sweat and tears that goes into creating this really effortless, beautiful thing, it's amazing."

Graham is clearly in awe of the contestants he has met at the Strictly Dance Fever auditions - those who were called back for a second day of auditions had just 45 minutes to learn a routine from scratch.

"I find it really moving, even something like line dancing, I find it quite emotionally stirring. When you watch a roomful of people doing it, all at the same time, there's something about it. I think it's quite tribal, it's deep within us all."

The programme makers invited people aged 18 and over (there's no upper age limit) to audition for the programme and they, "dance their hearts out to whatever music they want.

Based on that, they get callbacks and have to be able to learn a routine. Even by day two, the commitment to the programme is really quite big," says Graham.

"We had a 57-year-old, who is the oldest person so far who's got through to day two, and she was extraordinary.

"At the end of the day, there were all these 18-year-olds sitting on the floor, sweating and exhausted, and there was this 57-year-old woman, not a hair out of place.

"If nothing else, she should get a hairspray endorsement because it was very impressive," he laughs.

Graham has been involved from the early stages of production, attending auditions up and down the country, and he admits that he's enjoyed every minute of it, despite often having to provide a shoulder to cry on:

"I watch them, I hang out, I talk to them, and it's the law that if somebody cries I must interview them! If too many people cry I get annoyed though!

"Some people cry and it's really sweet. At the London auditions, there were two best friends and they'd been entering competitions together for years. One got through and the other didn't. Obviously you're genuinely sympathetic to that person."

But Graham thinks he may even find himself blubbing during the live shows when, one by one, a couple is eliminated each week.

"It's hard not to get involved, like this thing with Richard [Park] and Patrick [Kielty]… I so know I'm going to be like that! I'm going to have to say something to the judges if I disagree - I've got a microphone and it's live. Don't give me a microphone if you don't want me to say anything," he laughs.

"I'll know the contestants much better than the people who are judging them because I'll have known them for months by that time. I can so imagine that I'm going to be crying because, by day two, you're emotionally involved with these people, so four months in, the stakes are going to be so high."

And the fact that the shows are live will just add to the emotion.

Graham's used to fronting his own television programme and has had audiences in stitches with his live stand-up, but can he cut it live on 91Èȱ¬ ONE, or will he be just a little bit scared?

"Erm … I should be," he laughs. "I'm just assuming that everyone else on the programme is very good at making live programmes and I'll be protected. There's time in the show for people to run out and say, 'What are you doing?' - there are enough 'safety breaks' in the show.

"Other people do live TV. It's like driving a car - how hard can it be?" he laughs.

He's also equally calm about taking on the mantle of Saturday night TV:

"I think viewers couldn't care less about 'the battle for Saturday night' or 'can Graham crack Saturday nights?'

"In the end, I always think, 'They're only telly programmes'. It's on for an hour, there's something on the other side and there'll be another programme on after this, there was one on before it.

"People just watch for the entertainment - they don't care who's winning battles and who's presenting, they just want a good, fun show on Saturday night that you can either watch as a young person before you go out clubbing, you can watch as a kid before you go to bed, or you can watch as a parent before you put your kids to bed.

"That's what you want on a Saturday night and that's why it's tough, because it's tough for one show to tick all those boxes.

"I hope this show can - I think it can."