Barbara Marten

Marten was born in Leeds, West Riding of Yorkshire, and grew up in County Durham. She went to the all-girls William Newton School{{cite web |last1=Team |first1=Picture Stockton |title=Production of The Merchant of Venice, William Newton School |url=https://picturestocktonarchive.wordpress.com/2015/06/24/production-of-the-merchant-of-venice-william-newton-school/ |website=Picture Stockton Archive |accessdate=27 December 2018 |language=en |date=24 June 2015}} in Norton, then Stockton and Billingham Technical College.{{cite web |title=Stockton-Billingham Technical College, England, images |url=https://12000.org/my_courses/ORIGINAL_SCHOOL_IMAGES/stockton_billingham_technical_college/index.htm |website=12000.org |accessdate=27 December 2018}} She went to drama school at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art as a teenager for three years, and later said that it put her off becoming an actress. Marten trained as a teacher in Birmingham and taught for two years before being drawn back to the stage.

After becoming involved with a theatre group in Coventry, Marten joined a newly formed theatre group in Doncaster. They toured Yorkshire, performing plays about various subjects, including the St Leger, and another about battered wives.

In 1996, Marten appeared at the National Theatre in Helen Edmundson's adaptation of Leo Tolstoy's War and Peace. She has also appeared in various other plays such as Hamlet, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (at Manchester Royal Exchange{{cite news |last1=Cavendish |first1=Dominic |title=Review of the year: Regional theatre |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/theatre/drama/3669954/Review-of-the-year-Regional-theatre.html |accessdate=27 December 2018 |work=The Daily Telegraph|date=15 December 2007}}), The Winter’s Tale (at the Royal Exchange), Get Up & Tie Your Fingers (Customs House), The Awkward Squad (West End), Heldenplatz (Arcola), The Enemies Within, Some Kind of Hero (at the Young Vic), The Glass Menagerie (Lyceum, Edinburgh),{{cite news |title=Casualty launches Barbara on stage |url=https://www.scotsman.com/lifestyle/casualty-launches-barbara-on-stage-1-1240390 |accessdate=27 December 2018 |work=The Scotsman |date=10 January 2008 |language=en}} Everything Is Possible: The York Suffragettes (York Theatre Royal{{cite news |last1=Hutchinson |first1=Charles |title=Barbara Marten to lead cast in York Suffragette play Everything Is Possible |url=https://www.yorkpress.co.uk/news/15300796.barbara-marten-to-lead-cast-in-york-suffragette-play-everything-is-possible/ |accessdate=27 December 2018 |work=York Press |date=22 May 2017 |language=en}}{{cite news |last1=Simcock |first1=Georgia |title=York's women battle for equality in new community blockbuster show |url=https://www.yorkmix.com/entertainment/yorks-women-battle-equality-new-community-blockbuster-show/ |accessdate=27 December 2018 |work=YorkMix |date=21 June 2017}}) and a touring production of An Inspector Calls.{{cite web |title=Barbara Marten , Company , An Inspector Calls |url=https://www.aninspectorcalls.com/company/cast/barbara-marten |website=www.aninspectorcalls.com |accessdate=27 December 2018}}

From 1997 to 1999, she played the part of nurse Eve Montgomery in Casualty.{{cite web |title=BBC One - Casualty - Eve Montgomery |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/profiles/14Kf9khXqgb6XFyP6fXf2cH/eve-montgomery |website=BBC |accessdate=27 December 2018}}Chris Perry {{google books|IJQACAAAQBAJ|The Kaleidoscope British Christmas Television Guide 1937-2013|page=106}} Since then, she has appeared in many TV dramas, receiving much acclaim for her work in dramas such as Bob & Rose and Fat Friends. Marten played the lead role of Ellen in the film Between Two Women (2000), and then in A Passionate Woman (2010) as Moira. She appeared in the 2012 series Public Enemies.

Marten then played Hannah Greg in the period television drama series The Mill (between 2013 and 2014) which was about life at Quarry Bank Mill during the Industrial Revolution.{{cite web|url=http://www.channel4.com/programmes/the-mill|title=The Mill|publisher=Channel 4|accessdate=3 August 2013}}{{cite news |last1=Wise |first1=Lauren |title=10 times Cheshire was transformed into filming locations |url=https://www.cheshire-live.co.uk/whats-on/film-news/gallery/10-times-cheshire-transformed-filming-15127348 |accessdate=27 December 2018 |work=Chester Chronicle |date=13 September 2018}}

Barbara and her husband, Mike Kenny,{{cite news |last1=Burton |first1=Nigel |title=Twenty years on - what happened to the cast of Harry, the BBC drama shot in Darlington |url=https://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/news/14507851.twenty-years-on-what-happened-to-the-cast-of-harry-the-bbc-drama-shot-in-darlington/ |accessdate=27 December 2018 |work=The Northern Echo |language=en}} (writer of The Railway Children play) have three sons, Theo, Josh and Billy. Marten met Kenny in the 1980s, while acting in a student pantomime in Birmingham,{{cite news |title=Caitlin, The Studio, York Theatre Royal, February 12 to March 6 |url=https://www.yorkpress.co.uk/news/7892898.caitlin-the-studio-york-theatre-royal-february-12-to-march-6/ |accessdate=28 December 2018 |work=York Press |date=6 February 2004 |language=en}} when they were studying to become teachers. They have lived in York since 2004, having previously lived in Leeds. The children have studied at the Steiner School at Fulford.

In 2018, she was nominated for a Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Featured Actress in a Play for her role in People, Places and Things at National Theatre/St. Ann's Warehouse.{{cite web |title=2018 Nominees and Winners |url=https://www.dramadeskawards.com/2018-winners |website=www.dramadeskawards.com |accessdate=28 December 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180612020729/https://www.dramadeskawards.com/2018-winners |archive-date=12 June 2018 |url-status=usurped }}

{{Reflist}}

• [https://web.archive.org/web/20061222063909/http://www.stainforthonline.co.uk/faith/faith_cast_barbara_marten.htm#interview interview]
• {{IMDb name|nm0551649|Barbara Marten}}

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Category:Living people

Category:1947 births

Category:Actresses from County Durham

Category:Actresses from Leeds

Category:Alumni of the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art

Category:British television actresses

Category:People from Norton, County Durham

Category:Actors from the Borough of Stockton-on-Tees