Laura Evans

Laura Evans is a Welsh actress and singer/songwriter best known for her role as Madison in the popular BBC children's show The Basil Brush Show.^[1]

Early training

At the age of 14, Evans won a scholarship to the prestigious Sylvia Young Theatre School in London.^[2] and trained with her classmates, who included Billie Piper and Amy Winehouse

As a child, Evans performed the lead role at the Edinburgh Festival with the acclaimed National Youth Music Theatre in their production of Annie, before going on to play Blousey Brown one of the lead females in the BBC’s radio production of Bugsy Malone.

Acting career

Evans was one of the lead roles in BBC 's The Basil Brush Show, playing an American girl called Madison—which she based on Reese Witherspoon's performance in Legally Blonde, and on Phoebe from TV’s Friends. Evans appeared as a regular on the show for 4 seasons, and appeared in over 50 episodes from 2002 until 2007,^[3] and her role as Basil's next door neighbour earned her a place in British folklore as a member of Basil's gang. The episode 'Basils Angels' from the third series was nominated for a children's BAFTA Award in 2006. Bafta nominated

Evans has had several leading roles in pantomimes in the UK. She played the lead role in Cinderella at the Bristol Hippodrome in 2004 and 2005, reprised the role at the Liverpool Empire Theater a year later, and played Cinderella a third time at the Theatre Royal in 2008 and 2009. She has also appeared in Dick Whittington and His Cat in Northhampton opposite Julian Clary in 2006 and 2007,^[4] and again at the Capitol Theatre in London opposite Todd Carty in 2007 and 2008.^[5] In the Summer 2013 Laura appeared in the comedy feature film 'Inappropriate Comedy' alongside Lindsay Lohan and Adrien Brody. Inappropriate Comedy In September 2014 she joined other well known Welsh and American actors to celebrated the 100th birthday of Dylan Thomas, appearing in a staged radio play of Under Milk Wood with LA Theater works LA Theatre works alongside Mathew Rhys and Kate Burton directed by Sara Sugarman playing several roles and singing the famous folk song as character Polly Garter

Music career

At 15 Laura was part of a band named 'Love Bazaar' who were signed to Warner Music Group and were entered into the heats for the Eurovision song contest in 1998, with a song written by Brian Rawling Cher called 'Light up the World' the band failed to make it to the final round and were dropped by the label, the band broke up and Laura pursued a solo career with 'First Avenue Records' who looked after the girl band Eternal Laura recorded two albums worth of country pop material with Graham Wilson, but none were released. In 2010 Laura independently released an acoustic album under her own label 'Rosie Music' called Happy Sadness.. In summer 2012 Laura made a YouTube video of Rihanna's We Found Love that went viral, receiving 85,000 views in 2 days. Laura later released this song on iTunes. In April 2014 Laura released a country EP called Remember When the song 'More of Me' co-written with Ben Spivak from the band MAGIC! MAGIC was featured on the season 2 finale of FULL EPISODE on CMT CMT Party Down South on the CMT channel Other songs on the album have been placed on various TV shows 'What's Left of Me' co-written with country singer/songwriter Brett Detar and In Her Shoes co-written with Jenna Bryson

Filmography

• Dreams of Gold (1994)^[6]
• No Sweat (1998)^[7]
• The Basil Brush Show (2002 to 2007)^[3]
• Black Tower Temptation (2009)^[8]
• Schizofredric (2010)^[9]
• Capture Anthologies: The Dimensions of Self (2011)^[10]
• Underground Comedy (2011)^[11]

See also

• The Basil Brush Show

References

External links

• Official website
• Laura Evans at the Internet Movie Database
• Laura Evans profile at Mandy.com
• Basil Brush website
• Basil Brush at the BBC