Emma Katy Forbes (born 14 May 1965 in Hammersmith, London) is an English radio and television presenter.


Biography

Forbes's parents are Nanette Newman and Bryan Forbes. She attended the Hurst Lodge School.

Forbes presented the cooking slot on Going Live!, a position she won after bombarding the production office with ideas for 'makes'. She was then selected as co-presenter for the replacement BBC children's show Live & Kicking with Andi Peters from 1993 through to 1996 and also presented ITV's teenage problem show Speakeasy.

From 1994 to 1997 she hosted a Meridian Television revival of the panel show What's My Line?. (Her mother had been a regular panellist on the 1970s BBC version of the show.) She has voiced Mummy Hippo in the children's animated series, Peppa Pig. She also presented the Heart 106.2 breakfast show, alongside Jonathan Coleman, before she left to present on Capital 95.8.

Forbes was the face of a long-running television advert campaign for Head & Shoulders shampoo in the mid-to-late 1990s. In 1996, she was voted number 64 in the FHM 100 Sexiest Women Poll, and is still represented by Storm Models.

Alongside Mark Radcliffe, Forbes has co-hosted the Steve Wright show on BBC Radio 2. Also on BBC Radio 2 Emma presented a Saturday show from 6-8pm alongside comedian Alan Carr called Going Out with Alan Carr, and a Sunday morning breakfast show, replacing Pete Mitchell. On 13 December 2009, Emma announced that she would no longer be presenting her Sunday show on BBC Radio 2, but she continued to co-present Going Out With Alan Carr on Saturday evenings until April 2010, when she suddenly left the programme. It was later announced that she left because she wanted more days off than her bosses liked and had missed the show a few times up to that point being replaced by guest co-hosts. She later revealed that she didn't really like working on Saturday nights and would rather have her feet up on a sofa at that time of night.

Since March 2011, Forbes has been a regular discussion contributor on ITV's daytime show The Alan Titchmarsh Show.

Personal life

Forbes lives with her banker husband Graham Clempson (married September 1987), their two children, Lily (born 1996) and Sam (born 1999) and their Shih Tzu dog Scooby. She suffered from postnatal depression after both births. Forbes was Richard Attenborough's god-daughter.

When she took a professional break to have her two children, Forbes and her journalist sister Sarah Standing created the boutique children's fantasy shop "Semmalina" in Belgravia, London. Their other two resultant business ventures are "Star Bags" which creates the perfect 'goody bag' for children's parties; and "Star Grub" – boxes of children's party food to order. Forbes also designs various celebrity charity parties, and food product presentations.

Forbes is a patron of Great Ormond Street Hospital and is a supporter of Bolton Wanderers, as was her late father.