Dancing With the Stars season 34’s Robert Irwin feels closer to his late father, Steve Irwin, every year … especially now that he’s competing for the mirrorball.
In an interview with Access Hollywood, Robert shared that he thinks his dad would be “stoked” to see him dance on ABC’s hit competition show.
Steve would be proud of Robert’s DWTS journey:
“He was the sort of person where he just never held back,” Robert began. “He was passionate, enthusiastic about every single thing he did. And he loved life when he was just living on the edge and giving it 100. That is what this experience is.”
“I have the honor of continuing his legacy and my family’s legacy, and I never thought I’d get to do that by dancing. But, here we are. I’m just so grateful for that.”
“There isn’t a day goes by where someone isn’t sharing how dad inspired them,” he continued. “It means everything to me, because every year I live, I actually feel closer to my dad.”
“He’s part of every conversation,” he shared. “He’s part of my life. And I feel as though I get a little part of him back in some way, in every conversation I have about him, or any new story I hear about him, or in any new photo that I haven’t seen before.”
Steve’s memory lives on:
Robert knows how fortunate he is that there’s so much video footage of his dad, thanks to his show. “I’ll often come across archive footage that I haven’t seen before,” Robert added.
“And all of a sudden, his memory just starts flooding back. So it’s weird that decades later, after losing someone when I was 2 years old, I almost have an even greater picture of the person he was.”
“As I start to reach the same sort of milestones that he did as a young bloke growing up, I, yeah, I feel closer to him in a way.”
“My dad is like a superhero figure. He’s like this omnipresent, just a superhero to me. And I’m so grateful for that, because while I didn’t have much time with my dad, I have a human being who exemplifies everything I want to be in life.”
