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Stacey Dooley: ‘I work really hard – it’s one of my few talents’

Her critics say she is too emotional, has too many rough edges, even plays the ‘white saviour’. But the TV journalist gets the stories and is ratings dynamite

Stacey Dooley is so fresh-faced she could pass for a teenager. But, at 32, she has been making investigative programmes for 12 years, and has clocked up 80-odd documentaries around the world, taking on terrorists, paedophile networks, rightwing extremists and international drug dealers. She has just returned from Syria, where she met European Islamic State brides for her first Panorama; and Nigeria, where she got to know Boko Haram’s female suicide bombers. Last year, she wrote a bestselling book about inspirational women and won Strictly Come Dancing. On Friday it was announced that she had signed a £250,000-a-year golden handcuffs deal to work only for the BBC.

Earlier this year, she found herself splashed across the tabloids – first for starting a relationship with her Strictly dance partner Kevin Clifton, then for being labelled “a white saviour” by the Labour MP David Lammy after making a Comic Relief documentary and posting a photo of herself and a young Ugandan child on social media. It’s been a busy old time.

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from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2YcNyUD
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