Billie Piper
- Profession: Actress
- Place/Date of Birth: Swindon, England, 22 September 2020
- Associated with: Chris Evans
The 24-year-old is quoted as saying: "I’m still working it out and trying to find my feet.
"The first thing you think about in the day is the play but it’s seven hours before you do it.
"I’m quite stressed out and having a tough time. I’m still very green.
"In the theatre, unlike TV, you know you’re going to be working for two hours straight and you know you’ve got to be firing.
"It’s quite a hard role - there’s a lot of crying and shouting."
The play, about a love triangle, opens on February 28 and Billie is due to do eight performances a week including two on Thursdays and Saturdays.
Billie’s secret passion - Feb 16 2007
It seems former Doctor Who star Billie Piper has a strange obsession - with pretty wedding dresses.
The 24-year-old actress - who famously tied the knot with DJ Chris Evans in
"Every time I open a script and there’s a wedding I say, ’yes, I get to get married again’."
And luckily for Billie, she is soon to star as Jane Austen’s Fanny Price in an ITV adaptation of
The star, who shot to TV fame as the Doctor’s sidekick Rose Tyler, also admitted that she often visits her seamstress grandmother - to try on her bridal creations.
She said: "I go round and have a cigarette and say, ’can I pop that dress on?’ We’ll share a Superking and I’ll be wearing someone else’s wedding dress."
Billie is the Belle of the show - Feb 12 2007
Billie Piper is set to play a callgirl in a TV adaptation of the best-selling book Belle de Jour, it was revealed today.
Belle’s adventures, which started life as an anonymous internet blog, are being turned into a Channel 4 drama.
The new series is in development and should hit TV screens later this year.
Billie, 24, is best known for playing Rose Tyler in the BBC’s sci-fi hit Doctor Who.
The pretty star, who was a pop singer before she turned to acting, quit the show last year and appeared in the Victorian period drama The Ruby In The Smoke.
Her next role will be as Fanny Price in an adaptation of Jane Austen’s
A Channel 4 spokeswoman confirmed the news, saying: "The Belle de Jour drama is in early development and Billie Piper is attached to star in it."
Billie attacked over school comment - Jan 9 2007
Sylvia Young, head of the famous stage school, has attacked former pupil Billie Piper over "poisonous" stories about the institution that appeared in the star’s autobiography.
Young, 67, took the unusual decision to criticise one of her proteges following the publication of the book, Growing Pains, for which the actress, 24, signed a six-figure contract.
In the book, the former Doctor Who star writes that teachers ignored the fact that many of the pupils had serious weight problems and that she was constantly told she "should be lighter, smaller (and) thinner".
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Billie Piper was born September 22 1982 and propelled into stardom at the young age of 15.
Her fame began when she became the youngest female solo artist ever to debut at number one in the UK charts, with the feisty ’Because We Want To’ in the summer of 1998. Three months later she repeated the feat with the follow-up ’Girlfriend’, a slower R&B-tingle tune, which proved that this was one pop baby who could sing. In October 1998, the platinum-selling album ’Honey To The B’ took Billie’s career a step on and silenced the cynics who had said her success was sure to be short lived.
Throughout 1999 she took a step out of the limelight to work on her second album, whilst playing house with Five singer Ritchie Neville. Then in early 2000 Billie made her comeback with the single ’Day & Night’, an up-tempo song that hit the top of the charts.
Accompanying this comeback was a total image overhaul that offered up a far raunchy and overtly sexy individual. However, still in her late teens, the new image created quite a lot of press, and not all of it good, launching the debate as to whether it was suitable for young girls to copy her style.
Billie’s rock’n’roll lifestyle continued at great apace with a stalker, suspected drugs issues and her eventual marriage to, 16 years her senior, Chris Evans. The relationship that followed saw Billie’s demise from the public eye and the couple became more famous for their extreme partying, which as well as costing Chris his job at Virgin, also saw Billie flounder about with seemingly not much to do other than get drunk.
In 2003 she returned to her roots and polished her acting skills in the sunny climes of Los Angeles. On her return to the UK she quickly earned roles in television and film productions, her first being The Canterbury Tales that stunned viewers and changed their perception of her from a young pop princess to that of professional actress.
She later appeared in The Calcium Kid, Spirit Trap, Much Ado About Nothing, The Ruby in the Smoke and Mansfield Park, however it was her character Rose Tyler that awarded her the most acclaim.
In 2004 Billie signed to work on the new series of Doctor Who, as sidekick and companion of the good Doctor. She won Most Popular Actress category 2005 and 2006 for her work on the series, alongside Best Actress at the TV Quick and TV Choice Awards 2006 and Breakthrough Award at the Southbank Show Awards 2006, however on June 15, 2006, it was announced by the BBC that she was to depart in the final episode of the second series.
In October 2004 Billie and Chris began a trial separation that was to end in divorce, however the couple remain close friends, living just two houses away in the desirable Belsize Park area on London.
read more on Chris Evans
October 2007