Quotes from Arlene Phillips

My father was very proud of everything I did and he watched my career and my growing fame with great interest, but despite my mother dying so early on in my life, my relationship with my father - who was always a very remote figure - was never easy.

When you think about how many wars are created through the word religion it's hard to identify with it, or even accept it.

My career has just been fantastic - but most importantly, I have an amazing family.

I travel light obsessively. I take hardly any clothes or shoes because I think that all I need is a couple of work outfits, rehearsal outfits, a pair of trainers and one glamorous outfit you can re-wear and re-wear.

The best way of building up a habit for dance is to introduce it early.

In the 1960s everybody knew about Christine Keeler and Mandy Rice-Davies. No matter what class people belonged to, they were talking about these two young girls who had become mixed up in the Profumo affair. Extraordinary times.

I love fashion magazines and style magazines and when I'm travelling on an aeroplane I always have a big bag slung over my shoulder, which is full of magazines.

I would never go anywhere without a notebook and pen. I don't even sleep without a notebook and pen by my side.

Dad was a barber and Mum looked after the three of us and helped in school doing lunches. I was the middle child with an older brother, Ian, and younger sister, Karen.

I Iove a dancer who is willing to take risks with their body and go that extra mile to move the audience.

Not only was I not a good dancer, I was one of the worst. I didn't have the long thin legs, and I didn't have natural turnout. The only thing I had was determination.

Britannia High' is not set in a high school where people burst into song and dance for no reason. It's a performing arts school, so there is a legitimate reason for them to sing and dance.

TV is a cruel mistress; you can't afford to fail in any way.

When day-to-day living became too difficult for him, my father moved to a residential home near me and although he'd never had any sort of dementia test, he gradually became unable either to eat or go to the toilet on his own. Eventually the staff found him too difficult to manage.

I'm a mother - that's who I am totally. But I am also a creator. I manage to fit it all in because I'm very organised. Oh my gosh, I'm so organised, it's unbelievable.

I don't know how my parents ever paid for my dance classes when I was little. We even had to line our shoes with newspaper when there were holes in them because we couldn't afford to get them soled.

I always knew I wanted to dance and when I was eight, I started ballet lessons at a church hall. They all wore pink ballet shoes but I wore green, as they were cheap, and I remember everyone staring at me.

Women follow me around. On a British Airways flight, at Liverpool station - everywhere.

If you don't have an academic brain, if you are not interested in maths or science, you are treated as a second-class citizen.

The Paddy Stone dancers were all upwards of 5ft 6in and stunningly beautiful. I was stocky, tough-looking and 5ft 3in. So I became determined to create my own troupe.

It doesn't matter how old you are, with determination you can make your life what you want it to be.

I was probably around 14 or 15 when I became really conscious of those girls who were going on to the Royal Ballet school, and that I was not Royal Ballet school material, not by a long stretch.

Everything I do seems to get so much attention since 'Strictly Come Dancing.'

I think when you're doing a musical, you have to be attuned to the director's vision. You're working with a variety of people, singers and dancers, so you have to create movement and dance that is for all abilities. You have to further the story through the dance.