During the Christmas season, Anton Du Beke’s father assaulted and stabbed him, and he has spoken out about it.
Given that this is the first time he has spoken about the event, the Strictly Come Dancing judge, 57, predicted that his friends and family would be shocked by the disclosures.
The dancer, who was raised on a council estate in Sevenoaks by parents who were Hungarian and Spanish, found his love of dancing when picking up his sister from a nearby class.
While his mother supported his new interest, Antal, Anton’s father, “made a turn” towards him as drunkenness engulfed him.
Appearing on Kate Garraway’s Life Stories, Anton said: ‘The alcoholism and the violence…[it was] towards me, because I was a boy, a young man I suppose.
‘You’ve got an alcoholic father and a situation where if you’re in the house (he’s) drinking then you end up with the fights and stuff.
‘You’d move room to get away from all of it and then he follows you in and the next thing you know the violence starts and then it came to a head one evening, I ended up in hospital for three days.
‘I got stabbed, I’ve never said this out loud before,’ he said struggling to hold back his tears on the ITV show.
Anton said he was sure his family and friends did not know about the attack because he never saw any gain from speaking about his ordeal, telling Kate: ‘I’m a forward looker…I don’t like to look back, I like to look forward.’
Recalling the incident, he continued: ‘I got stabbed in the leg and in the stomach because of a fight on Boxing Day and it was an idiotic situation.
‘I remember walking out of the house to walk up to the hospital holding my leg and a police car drove past and I waved them down and I said “he’s in there with a knife”.’
‘Anyway, they carted him off and I ended up in hospital for three or four days. My only concern was getting back into the studio and dancing and the embarrassment of it.’
When questioned about his leg ailment, Anton said that he humiliated himself and replied that he had “pulled a hamstring.”
The professional dancer told host the Good Morning Britain presenter: ‘I can’t really believe I’m talking to you about this. I should’ve glossed over this.
‘Even the thought of that [the attack] being a thing sort of annoys me as well.’
Kate said Anton’s father was cleared in court of wounding his son and when he died, he did not attend his funeral.
‘Everything was about moving forwards, I felt sorry for my mum, this was her husband, she’s working two jobs and he chose to drink and be violent, it’s just life and you carry on,’ he said.
At the time, the aspiring dancer changed his name ‘from Tony Beke, who grew up on a council estate’ to ‘Anton Du Beke, The Show Man.’
He said: ‘I wanted a new start and a new beginning and I wanted to leave what went before, behind, and then move on with the rest of my life, I just wanted to be me.’
Anton also said his motivation to achieve success was not because of his father, explaining that he ‘hates woe is me.’
He continued: ‘I never sought any sense of confirmation or encouragement from him and I never did anything I did because of him. My motivation to do what I did was not because of that.’
After dancing with Anton on Strictly Come Dancing in 2007, Kate, who succeeded Piers Morgan as the host of Life Stories this year, said she understood he is “bigger than life” but also a “quite private” man.
She said: ‘He has a philosophy about his relationship with his fans that he is there to bring joy into their lives and doesn’t want to share any of his own troubles.
‘But with me he does, and it showed a huge leap of trust on his part, because many of the things we talked about he hadn’t even really talked about even with his close family, and I felt so honoured to be able to help him to share it.”
Having been a regular on the BBC One series since it debuted until he switched from the dance floor to the judging panel to permanently replace outgoing judge Bruno Tonioli in 2021, Anton was the longest-tenured professional dancer on Strictly.
Over the years, his famous companions have included Ann Widdecombe, Emma Barton, and former home secretary Jacqui Smith.
In addition to writing books like We’ll Meet Again, One Enchanted Evening, and A Christmas To Remember, Anton is also a published novelist. His solo tour, An Audience With Anton Du Beke, begins this month.
For this season of Life Stories, Kate has also chatted with actors Ruby Wax and Omid Djalili.
Kate Garraway’s Life Stories airs on Wednesday at 9pm on ITV1 and ITVX.
