Joanne Malin

Joanne Malin (born 22 March 1967) is a British television presenter who currently works for ITV Central on its flagship news programme Central Tonight in the West Midlands.

Biography

Originally from the Moseley area of Birmingham, Malin trained to be a dancer at the Italia Conti Academy in London and worked in local theatre productions. Her first professional show was "Jack and the Beanstalk" with Russ Abbott at the Birmingham Hippodrome, performing as "Little Miss Muffet" in the chorus. She then did a provincial tour with the show "42nd Street", before taking her next role as Frenchie in a six month sell-out tour of "Grease". After more panto in Birmingham, she took a nine month contract dancing on the QE2. At the age of 25, she then switched career and retrained by taking a National Council for the Training of Broadcasting Journalists course at Portsmouth, where she graduated with a distinction and won a prize for Best Documentary. Joanne started out working in the news departments of local radio stations before being hired by Reuters to work on breakfast news bulletins for Virgin Radio.

From here, she switched from radio to television, despite having no previous experience, and joined the infamous cable channel, L!VE TV in London as a newsreader and a stand-in presenter. During her time at the station, she presented coverage of the death of Diana, Princess of Wales. In 1998, Malin joined Central Television (where she had already made a few guest appearances in her previous career as a dancer) and became anchorwoman for the West Midlands edition of Central News. She has also made appearances in regional programmes broadcast across the whole Central region.

In August 2006, Malin made the headlines after accidentally swearing during an outisde broadcast on Central Tonight. She was in Stoke-on-Trent in Staffordshire with the Central Tonight tour bus, in overcast weather conditions, when she ad-libbed "...it would be lovely here in the sun, but it's pissing it down". Malin apologised shortly after this on-air mistake.

On October 10 2008, she announced her decisison to leave ITV Central, shortly after the announcement of 60 job losses at the station and a major restructuring of "Central News". Malin is due to present her final programme on October 31 2008. [ [http://www.birminghampost.net/birmingham-business/birmingham-business-news/creative-industries-news/2008/10/09/joanne-malin-to-leave-central-tv-65233-22004775/ Joanne Malin to leave Central TV] , Birmingham Post, 10 October 2008]

She currently lives in Alvechurch, Worcestershire with her husband Andrew (an orthopaedic surgeon) and her dog called Maisy.

Awards

In October 2006 she won the Royal Television Society Midlands Centre's Best On Screen Personality Award, for her work on "Central Tonight". She had previously won the award in October 2003 and has also won the Harold Wincott National Business Broadcasting Award for a series of business reports on "Central Tonight".

References

External links

* [http://www.itvlocal.com/central/news/?player=CEN_News_15&void=52847 Joanne Malin interview at ITV Local Central]