Martine McCutcheon

She had international success, reaching No. 1 in 5 countries with her debut single Perfect Moment. She released three albums to varying degrees of success, but her pop career stalled due to the poor reception of her third album in 2002. She has since appeared in various television programmes, in films such as Love Actually as 'Natalie', and on stage in My Fair Lady, where her portrayal of Eliza Doolittle won her a Laurence Olivier Award in 2002. She released her autobiography, Who Does She Think She Is? in 2000.

McCutcheon was born as Martine Kimberley Sherri Ponting at the Salvation Army Mother's Hospital in Hackney, London, when her mother, Jenny Tomlin, was 19. She endured a turbulent early childhood due to the abusive and irrational behaviour of her father, Thomas Hemmings. Her earliest memory of her father is him dangling her over a balcony by her ankles, 30 feet up in the air, threatening to drop her unless her mother did what he wanted. Despite Hemmings leaving when McCutcheon was 2 years old, he would return periodically to threaten her mother so her early years were spent running and hiding in order to escape him. When McCutcheon was nine, her mother won sole custody and an injunction was made against Hemmings seeing McCutcheon until she was 18. Read Less

The album spawned two singles – the number 2 hit "I'm Over You" and her follow up song "On The Radio". Despite only peaking at #25 the album still managed to sell around 250,000 copies. McCutcheon released her third album Musicality, a Broadway influenced cover album, in 2002. It reached number 55 in the albums charts, however her pop career stalled when due to poor sales her recording contract was cancelled.

In December 2011, on Irelands "The Saturday Night Show" Martine confirmed she was in the studio working on a new album due for release sometime in 2012. Read Less

Martine had worked on two BBC Radio plays, most recently with Ricky Tomlinson and Clive Anderson.

In June 2012 ITV confirmed that Martine would be one of a panel of judges on a news sports talent show called Let's Get Gold, set to air in July 2012. On the show, hosted by Vernon Kay, sporting teams would perform their sport adapted to be entertaining and be judge by the panel consisting of Martine McCutcheon, cricketer Andrew Flintoff, footballer Rio Ferdinand and singer Una Healy (The Saturdays). Read Less