Emma Willis, Josh Widdicombe and Johannes Radebe reveal how Strictly’s new three-host format will work after secretive audition process

Strictly Come Dancing is entering a new era with Emma Willis, Josh Widdicombe and Johannes Radebe sharing the presenting duties, but even the new hosts do not yet know exactly how their three-way partnership will work.

In their first major interview since being announced as the successors to Tess Daly and Claudia Winkleman, the trio revealed that producers are still experimenting with the format just weeks before the live shows begin.

Rather than assigning each presenter a fixed role, the plan is currently being developed around the strengths and chemistry of all three.

Emma explained on The Rest Is Entertainment podcast that there is no straightforward one-for-one replacement for Daly and Winkleman.

She said the production team has been using a series of rehearsal and production days to experiment with different approaches, while the three presenters get used to working together.

Josh offered a more colourful description of the arrangement, telling podcast host Richard Osman that the presenting team would operate like total football, moving around the show rather than staying in rigidly defined positions.

The trio’s appointment represents a significant change for Strictly. It is the first time since 2013 that the programme has had a three-presenter line-up, following the decision to replace Tess Daly and Claudia Winkleman with a completely new combination of presenters.

Johannes will not be a backstage roving reporter

One detail Emma was keen to clear up was Johannes’s role.

There had been suggestions that the Strictly professional dancer would take on a backstage position as a roving reporter. Emma confirmed that this will not be the case.

Instead, Johannes will be part of the presenting team alongside Emma and Josh, with the exact division of duties still being worked out.

The uncertainty is partly a result of how unusual the final line-up was for producers themselves. Emma described the decision to use three presenters as something of a wild card.

She recalled being told during the final callback that it was the last stage of the process and that producers were considering the possibility of putting three people together.

Even then, there was no finished script for the trio.

The idea was to bring the presenters into the room, put the material on screen and work out the format together.

A four-month audition process kept deliberately secret

Before they became Strictly’s new presenting team, Emma, Josh and Johannes endured an unusually secretive audition process that lasted around four months.

Josh described the experience as being very much cloak and dagger, even comparing it to the secrecy surrounding The Traitors.

The BBC went to considerable lengths to prevent people from discovering what the candidates were actually auditioning for.

At one point, potential presenters were told that they were involved with a fictional gardening programme called The Great Garden Glow Up.

The explanation was apparently intended for taxi drivers who might ask why a candidate was being taken to an unfamiliar location.

Josh recalled being told that, if his driver asked, the driver had been informed that he was going to audition for the supposed gardening show.

The situation became particularly amusing for him because he imagined the cab driver judging him for supposedly wanting to present a programme called The Great Garden Glow Up.

He joked that he would not have agreed to attend a chemistry test for a gardening programme if he had known that was supposedly what it was.

The secrecy extended to the candidates themselves. Emma, Josh and Johannes initially auditioned separately before being brought back for chemistry tests.

A number of other well-known presenters were also involved in the process. Zoe Ball and Sara Cox have both revealed that they took part in the secret auditions but did not secure the roles.

The new hosts confirmed that chemistry tests were conducted with different combinations of potential presenters before the final trio was assembled.

The moment Johannes walked into the room

The three did not initially know that they would eventually be tested together.

When Emma and Josh were finally brought into the same room as Johannes, Josh admitted that he was taken completely by surprise.

By that stage, he had seen the names being discussed in the media and assumed that the people mentioned publicly were the likely candidates.

Then Johannes walked into the room.

Josh recalled that his immediate reaction, and Emma’s too, was essentially that the combination seemed unexpected.

Johannes agreed that there had been a moment of confusion.

None of the three knew beforehand that they would end up together, making their eventual partnership something of a surprise even to the presenters themselves.

It was only after that final stage that the idea of the three-host format began to take shape.

Two weeks later, each of them received the call confirming that they had landed the job.

Their reactions to getting the job were far from glamorous

The moment each presenter learned that they had been chosen was also rather less glamorous than might be expected from one of television’s biggest presenting jobs.

Emma revealed that she took the confirmation call via Zoom while sitting on the toilet at a hairdresser’s.

Josh, meanwhile, was in a graveyard in Birmingham when he received his news.

After months of secrecy, auditions and chemistry tests, the three are now preparing to make their debut together on the Strictly ballroom floor.

But despite the excitement surrounding their appointment, the presenters have made clear that the format remains a work in progress.

With no direct replacement for Tess Daly or Claudia Winkleman and three presenters instead sharing the responsibility, Emma, Josh and Johannes are being given room to discover how the partnership works in practice.

For now, even the hosts do not have every detail mapped out.

What they do know is that they will be working as a team, moving around the programme and shaping their roles as the new Strictly era gets under way.