Aussie TV star takes on Dancing with The Stars
Big birthdays can often prompt people to take on new challenges. And so perhaps it was serendipitous that when New Zealand and Australian actress Rebecca Gibney turned 60 last year she was also asked a question that previously she had outright rejected: 'Will you take part in Dancing With The Stars?'
'I did think: I'm 60. I can either continue down the path of more wine, more hot chips, less exercise or I can take this moment and use it as a chance to reset. Reset my body, reset my brain and bounce into my 60s with a bit of vim and vigour,' Gibney says with a laugh.
Despite her enthusiasm, Gibney, best known for her role as Julie Rafter on Packed To The Rafters, admits walking into the rehearsal studio on that first day — having recently recovered from a bout of COVID-19 and carrying a little extra weight following a UK holiday — was a little intimidating. She says before the show, her dancing experience was limited to 'a few jazz ballet classes as a kid'.
'My (dance) partner was the reigning champion so the first thing I said to him was 'lower your expectations. mate!',' she says. 'He just said to me 'we're going to go very slowly'.
'It was much more of a physical and mental challenge than I was expecting.
'I did sort of beat myself up a bit wishing that I'd gotten a bit fitter prior, because I was probably about 20-30 years older than most of the others,'
The others in Gibney's 2025 cohort of the popular competition show include Olympians Harry Garside and Susie O'Neill, Comedians Felicity Ward and Shaun Micallef, and a collection of familiar faces from across Australian news, sport and entertainment including Osher Gunsberg, Trent Cotchin, Michael Usher, Karina Carvalho, Brittany Hockley, Mia Fevola, and Kyle Shilling.
'Most of them I was meeting for the first time and that's the best thing that's come out of this whole experience, the relationships that I have formed,' Gibney says. Rebecca Gibney. Credit: Nicholas Wilson
'It becomes such a tight-knit family. and because you are going through something random and weird that no one else would quite understand, it really bonds you quite quickly.
'And we were all from such different walks of life. There was the beautiful Susie O'Neill, who has won a gajillion gold medals in the swimming pool, but as soon as she got on the dance floor she was like the rest of us, completely out of her comfort zone.
'And Michael Usher who has been a news reader for 27 years and completely in control, but the minute he got out on the dance floor, he turned to jelly. So it was amazing to have the same experience and be able to share it with these people.'
Dancing With The Stars isn't the only new challenge Gibney has set herself this year. Next month she is starring in the Sydney Theatre Company production Circle Mirror Transformation, the first time she has done any theatre work in 23 years.
'My first thought is to go 'it's terrifying', but my son keeps going: 'Mum, nerves and fear and excitement are the same emotion, so flip it',' she says.
There seems to be a lot of advice being traded in the Gibney family. Her son, Zac Bell, made headlines last year when he gave a speech about his mum at the Logies when she was inducted into the Hall of Fame. Bell has recently finished up at drama school in New Zealand and is set to move to Sydney to follow in his mother's footsteps in the acting world.
'My biggest advice to him, because he has been auditioning a lot, and hasn't got as many roles as he obviously would like — he's had a couple of small ones, but he's had a few knock backs — and I've just said: 'Darling, you've always got to remember that what is for you will not pass by. That if it is meant for you, it will come',' Gibney says.
For Gibney, what was meant for her in 2025 was Dancing With The Stars, and no doubt many people will be cheering the unlikely contender on.
Dancing With The Stars is on Sunday, June 15, at 7pm on Channel 7 and 7Plus.
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