Emmerdale star Lawrence Robb, known for playing McKenzie Boyd, has been announced as the 12th celebrity for Strictly Come Dancing, and it has emerged he attended a dance school for two years.
From 2007 to 2009, Lawrence was a student at The Dance School of Scotland. Glasgow City Council shared a video message from the 34-year-old actor, where he discussed his dance experience.
Dance school background
In the message, he said: "I studied at Knightswood incorporating the Dance School of Scotland along with the musical theatre course back in 2007 and left in 2009." He then went on to study at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama.
Lawrence praised his dance teachers for the "care" they had for their students, saying: "If it had not been for the nourishment and the care and the love that the teachers put into teaching us, I've made friends for life at that place, it is up there with the two best years of my life. It gave me a wonderful springboard into the world of musical theatre and it's just a magical place to be. My experience there is what shaped me into the performer that I am today."
Debate over dance experience
As a musical theatre performer, Lawrence is thought to have had more professional dance experience than the average Strictly contestant. West End stars have often faced criticism for taking part, with musical theatre star Amber Davies heavily criticised last year when she proved a strong contender.
Similarly, Layton Williams was criticised for his West End experience, and actors like Danny Mac and Nigel Harman have faced backlash for dance training at drama school, as have those with non-ballroom dance backgrounds like Lewis Cope and Tasha Ghouri.
Fans remain divided, with some seeing an unfair advantage and others arguing Strictly would be boring without high-scoring dancers. Professional dancer Lauren Oakley told The Sun: "It's a completely different experience, my friend is ballet trained but she's had to unlearn a lot of things in order to do Latin. It's a completely different discipline and you have to almost it's not a blank page, you have to unlearn it before you."
Despite such comments, dance-experienced celebrities consistently score highly and make the final. Last year's winner Karen Carney danced as a child, Amber Davies made the final, and Lewis Cope often topped the leaderboard.
Lawrence isn't the only Strictly celeb with prior dance experience this year. Cach Mercer, Love Island winner, is trained in hip-hop and teaches dance classes, while Bethany Antonia is a West End star who played Eurydice in Hadestown.
