Nadia Almada

Nádia Conceição Almada^[1] (born Jorge Leodoro, 28 January 1977) is a British reality television star, best known for being the first transgender winner of Big Brother in series 5 in 2004.

Media career

Big Brother

Almada competed in the fifth series of Big Brother in 2004; she kept her gender reassignment operation a secret from fellow contestants although viewers were informed. After 71 days in the Big Brother House, she emerged as the winner, securing 74% of the overall vote and winning £63,500. She had regularly topped polls as the public's favourite Big Brother winner. Big Brother presenter Davina McCall has said Almada was her favourite housemate of all time.

Life after Big Brother

Almada went on to record a single entitled "A Little Bit of Action", which reached Number 27 in the UK Singles Chart in December 2004.^[2] She also made a guest appearance in the soap opera Hollyoaks turning on the Christmas Lights. She entered the Big Brother Australia house visiting the three finalists during week 14 and has made various appearances on televised chat shows and game shows (most notably on "Big Fat Quiz of the Year 2004"). In 2008 she co presented The Big Brother Launch Night Project on the launch night of Big Brother 9. She took part in Celebrity Fitness Videos Not Fit For TV, which was hosted by Lorraine Kelly and Eamon Holmes. The show featured celebrities performing Almada's own Latino inspired Dance/Fitness video, Latino Dance Workout, which she released in 2004.^[3]

In the beginning of time Almada was a contestant on the Channel Five reality show, Trust Me...I'm A Holiday Rep. Almada was a replacement for Britain's Next Top Model contestant Jasmine Lennard. The following year she was a celebrity guest on a four-day stay on Channel 4's reality TV show, Fool Around With...; her goal was to decipher who out of several male contestants was single, enabling them to win £10,000. In an interview with Heat magazine in June 2009, Almada revealed that she is writing her memoirs. In 2010, to mark the end of Big Brother in the UK, she appeared on a Big Brother winners special of Channel 4 show Come Dine With Me, with Big Brother winners Brian Dowling, Brian Belo and Sophie Reade. Almada finished in third place.

Ultimate Big Brother

On 24 August 2010, Almada entered the Big Brother house in Ultimate Big Brother; she immediately lost fans when she told Josie Gibson - who had won the eleventh and final series earlier that night - that her boyfriend John James Parton did not really like her. Josie left the house via the fire exit less than 48 hours later and Almada was blamed for this. Almada later had blazing rows with Coolio and told Big Brother in the Diary Room "it's either him or me!". Coolio was removed from the house shortly afterwards.^[4] She later had a blazing row with Ulrika Jonsson over a plate Ulrika accidentally smashed, and viewers labelled Almada a bully after this row. She was nominated for eviction on Day 8, and was evicted with 33.3% of the public vote in a double eviction after Makosi Musambasi on Day 11. Upon receiving a negative reception from the crowd, Almada broke down in tears during her post-eviction interview with Davina. Later that night, she did not appear on Big Brother's Big Mouth (a standard expectation of evicted housemates), which Davina McCall allowed. She also did not make an appearance on Big Brother's Little Brother on 5 September (another expectation of evicted housemates), which George Lamb allowed. She was the only Ultimate Big Brother housemate not to attend the final on 10 September 2010, which Davina McCall also allowed. She has stated that the show has made her consider suicide.^[4]

Nadia complained that Davina McCall had joked about her transsexuality on the supplementary show Big Mouth, introducing a guest as having "the boyish good looks of Nadia".^[5] McCall apologised for the joke.

Personal life

Almada was born in Ribeira Brava on the Portuguese island of Madeira, and named Jorge Leodoro,^[6][7] but was known as Carlos.^[8] Almada moved to England in 1996 and worked in a department store in Woking. She has also managed a children's bookstore. Before appearing on Big Brother, she worked as a cashier in Barclays bank. Her father, Luis, did not know his child was transgender until The Sun newspaper tracked him down and revealed the story. The Sun also dubbed Almada the Portugeezer, the "Portuguese Man O' War" and Nads, 'nads' being a slang term for gonads (testicles).^[9] Her mother had not seen her for a year, since before Almada's transition, but was there to welcome her back into the outside world after the show concluded.

References

External links

• Nadia Almada at the Internet Movie Database
• "Nadia Almada - Biography" IMDb, Retrieved 31 March 2007