Strictly's Sarah Hadland reveals two huge ways show has changed her

After starting her Strictly journey with a strong sense of her limitations, actor Sarah Hadland admits she’s had a complete revelation.

Keen not to be billed as the "poster girl" for older women, the 53-year-old Miranda star approached the BBC juggernaut show with caution, but has totally crushed her own expectations, becoming a firm favourite for the final.

From ditching her panic about bare legs and fake tan, to flying in the air in an eye-watering cartwheel lift, she has had a change of heart.

And now Sarah, who has been storming through stunning ballroom dances every week with professional Vito Coppola, wonders why so many women set limits for themselves.

Sarah, who lives in London with her young daughter, says: “Certainly at the beginning, I felt I know myself really well. I'm the age I am. I know what I can do. I won't have anybody else tell me what I can do. I'm happy to push myself, but if you tell me I can do something, I’ll say no, because I won't be told.

“I was setting limits without realising. I just thought, I'm quite a good dancer. I did a lot of dancing 30 years ago. I know what I can do, but in the same breath I was saying, ‘This is what I can't do’.

“So when Vito would say, ‘We're going to do this’, I would be very rigid. I’d say ‘No, I can’t do it, I need to rest, I can't do that step.’

“I thought I was being really assertive, but Vito was adamant that I could do it. If you’d told me the things I’d be doing, such as the lifts, I would have said 100% no. But I completely trust him. I mean I let him push me backwards off a table at speed.”

Sarah, dubbed Tigger along with Vito because they both don’t stop bouncing around and fidgeting, scored 39 in the couple’s choice dance to Padam Padam in Blackpool, even getting a shoutout on Instagram from Kylie. Sarah said afterwards that her change of attitude about limiting herself has made a massive impact on her life.

She says: “I think a lot of women do that to themselves. And it still goes on for women of a certain age that people say, ‘You can’t do this’.

“But I think you also have to change your mindset, because if you say this is my limitation, then other people agree and it becomes something very solid.

“It's made me think, ‘Who's setting the boundaries? Is it always other people, or am I complicit in it? If someone pushes me, do I take it as an insult because I think they’re wrong?’

“As a parent, you say to kids, just try it. It doesn't matter if you make a fool of yourself. It doesn't matter whether you're good at it or not.

“We stop applying that to ourselves and why? Maybe you don’t want to look like a fool, and I think society is a little bit more critical of women in terms of what we should or shouldn't be doing, particularly when it comes to physical achievements.

“I’ve had so many messages from women around my age, because lots of women danced when they were younger, and now they will go back to it. It’s physical activity that is fulfilling and is really enjoyable.

“You often hear of men continuing sports but with women, it's much more open to criticism, and I think we should really be challenging that.

“I think that's why I was quite conscious coming into this that I did not want to be the poster woman for older women. I just wanted to do it and say, I'm doing this, and I'm 53 and if you want to draw some parallels, please do. Say, well hang on, I'm in my 50s, I could be doing something like this.”

Sarah does admit that she really feels the fear every week on the show, despite people thinking she’s always confident - but she’s fully embracing every aspect, even the tough training.

While sipping a hot chocolate (this is a big deal, she usually prefers tea), she laughs: “I’m drinking a lot of whole milk these days and eating so much protein. I'm eating a bag of grated cheese while I watch TV.

“The training is very full on and I think it’s more mental than physical. There are some dances that are physically exhausting, like the Argentine Tango, but it’s the brain.”

She then breaks into an uncanny impersonation of Italian dancer Vito, who she has a clear chemistry and friendship with.

She says: “We clicked immediately. We’re both very up, very high energy and it’s a lot.

“I’m not sure how we’ll do the rumba this week, which is supposed to be slower. Vito calls me Trilli, which is Italian for Tinker Bell, or as he calls it very endearingly, Tinky Bell, because I can’t stand still.”

She adds: “The rumba is very sensual and I’m trying to channel my angst. We are also doing a samba-thon with all the couples on the dance floor at once. I am so here for it. I said to Vito, ‘Let’s just move really fast so no one can stop us’.”

Sarah, a superfan of the hit show, believes you must embrace Strictly and hates to see contestants in previous series holding back.

She says: “If I've seen somebody on it who looks a bit embarrassed to be there, I die a bit on the inside, because I think, don't do it unless you want to go in wholeheartedly - because for the fans, you're living somebody's dream.

“What’s stopped me doing this in the past is thinking I’d be cringing coming down the stairs. But now I come down like I’ve won a prize every week. Vito and I dance away like we’ve never been let out before.

“I decided I didn’t want to be too cool for school, just shimmying casually. I’m all in, I want to max it out. I’m doing it for the people who want to be doing it.

“Women of my age are telling me they had expected to see people over 50 doing gentler moves. Once Vito unlocked this, I thought ‘I’m going all out’. How can we make this harder and more difficult? As a viewer, you want to go ‘Wow,’ you want to see people do those crazy lifts. You want people to go for it.”

But it hasn’t always been smooth sailing.

She says: “The worst moment was catching my heel in my dress at the beginning of the Argentine Tango. It was a horrible, sickening moment, because Vito, God bless him, still managed to get me up in the air, but it wasn't it wasn't as slick as we'd rehearsed.

“I had that split second thinking that I was going to tip backwards and it’s your worst nightmare.

“But then my best moment was when he lifted me up in a cartwheel during the American Smooth. I did feel like I was flying. That was amazing.”

Sarah reveals she even set limits on what she would wear at first, but that has changed.

She laughs: “The first week I confidently told the costume designer that I won’t be having bare legs on television, thank you very much.

“Cut to me now and I’m like, ‘Oh could this be a bit shorter?’ And there are conversations you hear, because Vito’s head had to come between my legs for the lift, so someone says, ‘Can we get Vito’s head through her crotch any quicker?’

“It’s hilarious because they sew you into these phenomenal costumes.

“I hadn’t expected the last minute nature of it all, but the level of expertise just makes you realise you don’t need to panic.

“Your costume might just be a pair of pants and a scarf but come 6.15pm it will be something jaw dropping. And the makeup - you look like a Fraggle from Fraggle Rock. You look desperate. Your eyes look like currants. Then you come out of the room looking like Raquel Welch. And you think, how did that happen?

“When I danced to Proud, I had five people working on my costume and I’m in it and they’re on the floor while someone is fake tanning the tops of my thigh with a tanning mitt.”

Apparently all the backstage action happens in the makeup room.

Sarah reveals: “It's the most fun place on the planet, because you go in there, it's organised chaos, because you've got so many people.

“There's just makeup everywhere, wigs and everybody leaves that room looking incredible. I laughed so much one week that I cried off the makeup.”

Teasing that tonight’s costume will be something very slinky, Sarah adds: “Vito actually sketches ideas of my costumes in an exercise book.

“The head is like some sort of triangle. It's like a child's drawing of a body. Then he presents them with his sketch, and they're like, er ok!”

Fortunately, Sarah has been able to do Strictly between acting work, with filming for the next series of BBC comedy Daddy Issues starting in February, but she still has to juggle the show with parenting.

“It is a lot,” she says, “but I deliberately chose not to do any other TV work. It fitted in perfectly.”

Beyond that Sarah has already signed up to do the Strictly Come Dancing Live Tour in February.

She says: “I was recommended to do that by lots of people who've done the show before. They said the tour will bridge the come down after Strictly.”

Before all this of course, there is a show to do and Sarah has her sights set on the final.

She says: “I would absolutely love to be in the final. That will be goal achieved.

“Vito has been really clear from day one, that we go week to week, and that is the only way mentally to manage the situation. Each dance is like a stepping stone.”

*Strictly Come Dancing continues tomorrow, BBC One, 7.05pm.

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