20 January 2023 , 16:20
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Ice skating duo Christopher Dean and Jayne Torvill will be showing off their skating prowess in this week’s episode of Dancing On Ice, as the competition returns after Ofcom complaints last week.
The ITV show was inundated with complaints after Love Island 2022 winner Ekin-Su Culculoglu performed a sexy routine which saw her land in the bottom two.
Olympic medallists Dean, 64, and Torvill, 65, will be doing a fast tango-style routine to Canadian singer Michael Buble’s Higher on the ITV show on Sunday as it returns for the second episode of the series.
The pair are best known for winning a gold medal at the 1984 Winter Olympics, have been skating five times a week from September to perform for the first time in front of a full live audience since the pandemic.
Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean will skate together for the first time on TV since the pandemic (WireImage)
The pair judge and present Dancing On Ice on ITV (ITV)The couple's nearly 49 years of partnership has translated into an "unspoken connection" and "sixth sense" on and off the ice, according to Dean.
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Dean said: "It's funny that I'll pick up the phone and call Jayne and she'll just say, at that moment, 'I was just going to call you'."
He added: "Some days we'll turn up somewhere, we've got sort of matching clothes in some way and then we’ll organise something similar to each other."
Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean won gold at the Sarajevo 1984 Winter Olympics and became the highest scoring figure skaters of all time (Mirrorpix)Torvill agreed, saying: "So it’s almost like your minds are reading each other’s mind and, then you start to say it."
She added: "We’ve been together for so long and we grew up together as teenagers."
Torvill also said they are both conscious of their synchronicity while judging Dancing On Ice so they do not repeat the other's remarks.
She explained: "It’s not often we don’t give the same mark and that’s not because we’ve decided to give the same mark.
Last week the dancing competition was inundated with complaints to Ofcom after a sexy routine from Love Island's Ekin-Su Culculoglu (Matt Frost/ITV/REX/Shutterstock)"It’s what we think and comments wise, when we watch a performance, they’re all very similar, but we try, not to say the same thing."
Both said they were impressed by Nile Wilson last week for his emotional dance to Harry Styles' Sign Of The Times and were most looking forward to the first drag queen on Dancing On Ice, The Vivienne, giving a performance on episode two.
Dean added: "When we first saw everybody, for the first time, I think Nile stood out at that point because he was very determined to get things right.
"And there was one particular move that we gave him, that he just wouldn’t stop doing it until he could do it – so, dogged determination.
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Ekin-Su Culculoglu and Brendyn Hatfield performed a raunchy routine for her debut performance"But also, I was quite taken by The Vivienne who had a similar mindset."
Torvill agreed that the RuPaul’s Drag Race UK winner’s skate skills look "really strong".
Dean said he also often feels “sorry” for the celebrities as they learn in such a short space of time what he and Torvill have perfected over decades.
Torvill added: “What I like about this year’s group of celebrities, they all seem very passionate about it, they really want to do well.”
Dean said Diversity dance troupe founder Ashley Banjo and former Strictly Come Dancing judge Oti Mabuse, who also serve as judges on the show, offer a different judging viewpoint.
He added: "They’re looking at it from a performance point of view and a dance point of view and a timing point of view. So they’re experienced dancers in their own right."
Dancing on Ice continues Sunday on ITV1 and ITVX.