Shirley Ballas
English ballroom dancer
People close to me throwing me under a bus for a crust.
What has been your biggest disappointment?
Question
What did you want to be when you were growing up?
Identity & self
Question
What would you like to be remembered for?
Death & what remains
Question
Which moment embarrassed you most?
Failure & regret
Question
How would you describe yourself in three words?
Identity & self
Question
What most recently made you cry?
Identity & self
Question
What is the trait you most deplore in others?
Values & belief
Originally asked
The Guardian, to a different person each week, The Q&A
This exact question recurs in The Guardian's institutional Q&A pool.
You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.
Not playing Stanley Kowalski in A Streetcar Named Desire. I am a huge Brando fan and a big Tennessee Williams fan and it’s a part I would love to have a go at. It’s possible I still could but I’m too old, really.
The Q&A, The Guardian, 16 May 2026 source ↗
Others on this question
View all 366 →
Alexa Chung
English television presenter
Realising adults don't know everything.
My wife and I were meant to meet Frank Sinatra before he went on stage in Hamburg. But there was a taxi-drivers’ strike and we were too late.
Mary Portas
English retail consultant
Not being able to take up my place at Rada.
More from Alex Hassell
View profile →My brother Joe, he’s nine years older than me.
As someone with integrity.
On one of my first jobs, Cold Mountain, I got a wasp in my ear in front of Jude Law. He couldn’t see the wasp so just saw me freak out.
Driven, sensitive and playful.
On Monday in therapy.
Careless cruelty.
More on failure & regret
- Who most deserves an apology from you, and why? 209 answers
- If you could edit your past, what would you change? 203 answers
- What is the worst thing anyone has said to you? 122 answers
- Which moment embarrassed you most? 122 answers
- How has a failure, or apparent failure, set you up for later success? Do you have a favourite failure? 69 answers
- What is the hardest thing that has happened to you, and what did you carry out of it? 36 answers
Also answered this
Jessica Brown Findlay, Billy Porter, Tina Brown, Prue Leith, Rebecca Ferguson, Jonnie Peacock
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