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Background

The eldest daughter of the late John Patrick Fox and Carole Ann Wilken, Samantha Karen Fox comes from a family of market traders in the East End of London. She has a sister, Vanessa, who is six years younger, and a half-sister, Frederica, from her father's second marriage.

She attended St Thomas More RC School, Haringey and took a keen interest in the theatre from an early age. She first appeared on a theatre stage at the age of three, and was enrolled in the Anna Scher Theatre School from the age of 5. Her first television appearance came in 1976, at the age of 10, in a BBC play entitled No Way Out. Following on from this, she started at the Judi Dench Mountview Theatre School, near her home in Haringey, at the age of 11.

Interested in music from an early age, she formed her first band, with Richard Smart on guitar, Edward Gallagher on triangle and Bob Day on tambourine, at the age of 14. Her first record deal came a year later, with Lamborghini Records. However, both her theatre and music careers went on hold when her modelling career took off.

Modelling career

In early 1983, Carole Fox photographed her 16-year-old daughter in lingerie, and submitted several pictures to The Sunday People newspaper's "Face and Shape of 1983" amateur modeling contest. Fox came joint runner-up in the contest, had her pictures published, and was soon after invited for a test shoot for The Sun newspaper's Page Three feature. Her parents gave their consent for their daughter to pose topless, and on Tuesday, 22 February 1983, Fox's first Page Three photograph was published under the headline "Sam, 16, Quits A-Levels for Ooh-Levels".

Fox's cockney background, bubbly-blonde looks, winning smile, and 36D bust made her an enormously popular Page Three model. After famously insuring her breasts for a quarter of a million pounds sterling, she won The Sun's Page Three Girl of the Year award for three consecutive years between 1984 and 1986. She also posed nude for several British men's magazines and was a UK Penthouse Pet, but very few full-frontal shots were ever published.

Fox retired from Page Three modelling in 1986, at the age of 20, by which time she had arguably become Britain's premiere sex symbol of the era. In 1995, aged 29, she made a one-off appearance in The Sun to promote Page Three's 25th anniversary week. After receiving an overwhelmingly positive reader response, she appeared in the slot every day during the anniversary week, with Friday's final topless picture given away as an A3-sized poster. In 1996, aged 30, she appeared in the October issue of Playboy magazine.

In September 2008, readers of The Daily Star tabloid newspaper voted Fox as the top Page 3 pin-up girl of all time. At the age of 42, she posed topless for the tabloid, her first topless appearance in twelve years.

Music career

In the late-1980s, Fox began a successful singing career on Jive Records, producing three albums in three years (1986–1988), and working with notable music producers such as Stock Aitken Waterman and Full Force.

1980s

She released her debut single, "Touch Me (I Want Your Body)", when she was 19 years old in March 1986. The single made the Top 10 on both sides of the Atlantic (#3 in the UK; #4 in the US). It also topped the charts in many countries, including Canada, South Africa and Australia. Her debut live performance came at Peter Stringfellow's club Hippodrome. Her second single "Do Ya Do Ya (Wanna Please Me)" also made #10 in the UK though fared less well in the US. The third release from the album, "Hold On Tight" managed to secure a top 30, placing in the UK singles chart (#26) while the final single, "I'm All You Need" just narrowly missed the UK Top 40 (#41).

Within a year, Fox had released her second album, Samantha Fox (1987), again on Jive Records. The first single released from the album, "Nothing's Gonna Stop Me Now", enabled her to achieve her third (and final) top ten hit in the UK (#8), though it only managed to peak at #80 on the US Billboard charts. The track was produced by the legendary production team Stock/Aitken/Waterman. The second single release, "I Surrender (To the Spirit of the Night)", failed to match the success of its predecessor in the UK and peaked at #25 in the UK. The next two releases, "I Promise You (Get Ready)" and "True Devotion", both failed altogether to make the UK Top 40 singles chart. "True Devotion" was a substantial radio hit in Canada. The fifth and final single, "Naughty Girls (Need Love Too)", turned the fortunes of the album around and managed to secure a top ten placing on the US Billboard charts (#3), becoming her biggest hit to date in the US and scoring Fox another Top 40 hit on the UK singles chart (#31). The track was a different sound for Fox, being produced by the US hip-hop producers Full Force. They would continue to work with Samantha on subsequent albums and achieve similar success with her stateside, whereas her changed sound did not fare as well for her with European listeners, who preferred the Euro-pop sound of her earlier music.

The following year, Fox released her third album, I Wanna Have Some Fun (1988), also on Jive Records. The album was produced by various producers covering the Euro-pop sound. Two tracks, "Next to Me" and the title track, reunited her for Full Force, where another reunion with Stock Aitken Waterman saw her record a cover of Dusty Springfield's "I Only Want to Be with You", and the SAW original "You Started Something". The first UK single released from the album was "Love House". The second single released in the UK, "I Only Wanna Be with You", managed to secure her her biggest hit in over a year, peaking in the Top 20 at #16. The first single release in the US fared even better. The title selection, "I Wanna Have Some Fun", produced by Full Force, managed to peak in the US Top Ten at #8 (although when released as the third single in the UK it only managed a #63 placing). The American release, as the follow-up, of "I Only Wanna Be with You" peaked inside the US Billboard Top 40 at #31. No further singles were released from the album.

1990s

In 1991, after a three year break, Fox released her fourth album, Just One Night, again on Jive Records. The first single lifted from the album, "(Hurt Me! Hurt Me!) But the Pants Stay On" was another Full Force production. However, the lead single failed to make an impression in either the UK or US charts. Second single, "Another Woman", originally produced by Ralf-Rene Maue, was remixed by PWL stable-mate Phil Harding for release and performed moderately on some European charts. A third single, the albums title track, was also released. A bonus track, "Now I Lay Me Down" (again a Full Force production), was featured in the film A Nightmare on Elm Street 5: The Dream Child and on the accompanying soundtrack.

In 1992, Jive released Samantha's first official compilation, Greatest Hits, which featured three new tracks. Fox co-wrote and performed the track "Go for the Heart" for UK submission in the Eurovision Song Contest in 1995. It was performed as Sox featuring Cris Bonacci and Lorraine McIntosh. The song placed 4th in preliminary public voting and was therefore not selected as the representative track. "Go for the Heart" was a modest hit throughout some European territories.

In 1997, she released a new album, 21st Century Fox. It performed moderately throughout Europe and Scandinavia. Without a worldwide distribution deal the album suffered from little promotion and a staggered release schedule. Singles "The Reason Is You", "Deeper", "Let Me Be Free" and "Perhaps" made little chart impression (although "Let Me Be Free" was a Top 20 hit in The Netherlands) despite Fox making numerous television appearances to promote the album. In 1999 Sam was cast in her first stage musical, Tayla Goodman's Virus, but she had to withdraw when the backer pulled his money.

2000s

In 2004, Fox teamed up with Mats Soderlund (alias Gunther) in order to do a remake of "Touch Me". In November 2005, Fox released her latest album, Angel with an Attitude in Canada produced by Joe Barrucco. It was reissued in Australia to coincide with the Countdown Tour and included a new version of "Touch Me". 2008 saw the release of "Midnight Lover", a Euro-dance collaboration with Greek production team Zante Dilemma. In the summer of the same year, Samantha Fox performed at Sopot Festival in Poland, during a concert dedicated to the music of the 1980s, alongside Sandra, Sabrina Salerno and Thomas Anders (ex-Modern Talking).

In September 2009, Fox was a guest vocalist on the track "Tomorrow" by Marc Mysterio and in October 2009 Fox's first three albums were reissued in the US with bonus tracks. In December 2009, her latest compilation was issued, Greatest Hits, both in single CD and double CD formats.

2010s

In 2010, Fox teamed up with trance superstar 4 Strings to release a new single, "Forever". Summer 2010 saw the release of a duet with Italian singer Sabrina Salerno in which they performed a cover version of Blondie's hit "Call Me". Released in Italy on June 15, the single peaked at #4 in the Italian Dance Singles Sales Chart on the first week of July.

Film and television

Fox's pictures gained her such fandom in India that she was invited to star in a Bollywood film Rock Dancer. This was written and directed by V. Menon, starring Shammi Kapoor, Kamal Sadanah, Ronit Roy, Sharon Prabhakar, and Johnny Lever among others. It also featured guest appearances from Govinda, and was produced by Subbir Mukherjee.

In 1989, Fox co-presented the BRIT Awards with Mick Fleetwood, which became notorious for turning into a shambles; Fox has asserted in interviews since that the autocue did not work properly that night, leading to utter chaos during the show's live TV broadcast. She spent a year in New York presenting pop promo videos for MTV, and she made other attempts at TV presenting, including an interview with Rolf Harris, which was ill-fated even before it started as Fox referred to her interviewee as "Ralph" on several occasions, although he got his own back by resting his beard against her neck and tickling her with it.

She appeared on the sitcom Charles in Charge in 1990 where she played the role of Samantha Steele, a fictional rock star whose agent pushes her to romance Charles (Scott Baio) in order to get the paparazzi to print it in the tabloids.

Fox featured in the ITV programme An Audience with... Ken Dodd, during which she asked him how he liked to use his famous tickling stick, a multicoloured feather duster. Dodd responded by nonchalantly moving into the audience and letting the item stroke Fox's collar, before violently plunging down it her cleavage, making her scream and giggle.

Fox also featured in It's Been Real, written and directed by Steve Varnom and starring John Altman, and The Match, written and directed by Mick Davis and starring Pierce Brosnan, Ian Holm, Tom Sizemore, Neil Morrissey, David Hayman and Ilar Blair.

In 2003, she appeared in a reality television show The Club, competing against Richard Blackwood and Dean Gaffney by trying to run the most successful bar in The Club, which was full of celebrity guests such as Katie "Jordan" Price.

In 2008, Fox and her partner, Myra, took part in Celebrity Wife Swap, exchanging with Freddie Starr and his wife Donna.

In November 2009, she took part in ITV's I'm a Celebrity…Get Me Out of Here. She was voted out on the 16th day.

In July 2010, Fox appeared on come dine with me with Callum Best,Janice Dickinson & Jeff Brazier.

Other sidelines

In 1986, Fox was featured in a strip poker game (Samantha Fox Strip Poker) for Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum, MSX, BBC Micro, and Amstrad CPC.

She also appeared in Fort Lauderdale, Florida for Spring Break, where she sang her various then current hits to thousands of college students.

Personal life

Fox's father Patrick, a former carpenter, managed her career until 1991, when Fox hired accountants to trace over f1 million that she believed he had embezzled from her accounts. She then sued her father, who by then had divorced and remarried, and in May 1995 she was awarded a f363,000 court settlement. Patrick Fox died in 2000, at which time he and Fox had not spoken for almost a decade.

In 1994, it was reported that Fox had become a born-again Christian. That year, she played at the Christian arts festival Greenbelt.

She became distant from Peter Foster and said:

"I'm old enough now to know that I'd never be taken in again by the likes of Peter Foster. But then, I was 22 and impressionable. My parents had split and here was a man who was clever, manipulative and domineering. I came close to marrying him because I was so vulnerable." — Samantha Fox.

Some time after the Bai Lin Tea controversy he suggested that Samantha and he make a film about their lives, but she sent a refusal via her lawyer.

Rumours regarding Fox's sexual orientation began to surface in 1999 when she judged a lesbian beauty pageant, and gossips started to circulate that the woman she lived with at the time, Australian Cris Bonacci, formerly guitarist with Girlschool, was more than just her manager.

In February 2003, she made a statement about her personal life:

"I have slept with other women but I've not been in love before Myra Stratton. People say I'm gay. I don't know what I am. But I can't keep saying, 'Maybe', or denying it. It is time to let people know where my heart is. People keep trying to say I'm a lesbian. I don't know what I am. All I know is that I'm in love with Myra [Stratton, her manager]. I love her completely and want to spend the rest of my life with her."

Part of her reluctance to come out was due to fears of how some of her fans might react to her being in relationship with a woman, as she had already had to deal with obsessed fans and stalkers.

In August 2009, Samantha Fox announced her plans to have a civil partnership with her long term girlfriend and manager, Myra Stratton.

Charitable activity

Samantha Fox donated her favourite bra to a charity auction which allowed fans to buy a piece of celebrity clothing. Sense-National Deafblind and Rubella Association's Strip It Off three-day auction which began on 4 March 2008 saw members of the public bidding for stars' garments in order to raise money for the deaf blind charity.