Biography:

“I am in the entertainment business,” says John Barrowman, a roguish smile on his lips, eyes burning with something resembling determination, “and so I have positioned myself accordingly: as an entertainer in the business, and an all-round one, you might say."

You can say that again. Who else, in recent times, has acted on stage and screen, been a judge on reality TV and saved the planet from aliens as Captain Jack Harkness in Doctor Who and Torchwood?
“Though I couldn't possibly say so myself," he laughs, “my manager would also tell you that I can sing a wide variety of songs that, just perhaps, a mainstream audience hasn't yet realised. He's a good guy, my manager."
And so too is John Barrowman himself, a man so palpably of the moment and so heart-warmingly ubiquitous that The Times recently proclaimed him a national treasure on a par with Stephen Fry, Alan Bennett and Victoria Wood.

In addition to the aforementioned Captain Jack, Barrowman has also been seen on our screens recently as a judge on the Saturday night talent show Any Dream Will Do, and as a hilarious guest on The Friday Night Project, Never Mind the Buzzcocks and Jonathan Ross's BBC1 talkshow, where he writhed lasciviously on Ross's desk, prompting the eyebrows of fellow guest Andrew Lloyd Webber to rise all the way up to 11.
"It was a late-night show," he explains, as if in mitigation, "and so I acted accordingly, ha ha."

And now, not simply because he can but because he is blessed with a voice many a modern day singer would envy, he has returned to his first love, music.

This November, TV's busiest multitasker will release what is effectively his debut album. It's called ‘Another Side’, and comprises of songs that John has long admired and wanted to reinterpret in his own distinctive way. Across a number of musical genres, but predominantly sumptuous, streamlined pop, he lends his rich vocals to, amongst others, Cyndi Lauper's "Time After Time", Elton John's "Your Song", and Chicago's "If You Leave Me Now". His rendition of Billy Joel's "She's Always A Woman To Me" is velvet and sensuous, and he even manages to reinvent "I Am What I Am" from La Cage Aux Folles in a manner redolent of one with such a strong background in West End musicals.
“If I may say," he says with trademark mischievousness, “I see myself being very different from the average singer. I have released records before, Broadway companion albums mostly, but this is my first for a mainstream audience. But I do want to make it absolutely clear here and now: I am not trying to be a pop star. I'm just trying to make a high quality album full of songs that I hope people would want to hear me sing. For those who only know me on television, I'd like them to discover another side of me." He clears his throat theatrically. “I can hold a tune, you know."
He can indeed.

Singing, John Barrowman will readily tell you, was always his first love. He has an early memory in which he was five, maybe six years old, and accompanying his mother to the Glasgow record shop at which she worked in the early 1970s.
“I used to stand on the counter and sing the Top 10 hits to all the customers," he recalls, laughing like a drain. “My favourites were “Milly Molly Mandy" by Glenn Poole and “Long-Haired Lover From Liverpool" by Jimmy Osmond. And, yes, there is photographic evidence! My mother, you see, was always very encouraging in that respect. She would have parties, and right there in the middle of the room, in front of all these people, there I'd be, singing into a wooden spoon. I've always loved to sing, and I've never shied away from any opportunity to perform."

When he was eight, the family relocated from Glasgow to Illinois due to his father's work, and it was here that, later, a teenage Barrowman would develop his love for all things showbiz by attending a performing arts university, studying music and theatre. Returning to the UK in the late 1980s, he quickly began to make a name for himself upon the London stage. His professional debut came in 1989 in a West End production of Cole Porter's Anything Goes, and over the next few years he would appear in Miss Saigon, Beauty and the Beast, Matador, Hair, The Fix (for which he received an Olivier nomination), Sunset Boulevard and The Phantom of the Opera, winning plaudits and praise. At the same time, he was also dallying in television, appearing on BBC1's flagship Saturday morning show Live and Kicking alongside Andi Peters and Emma Forbes, while over in New York, Darren Starr, the man behind Sex and the City, cast him in a drama series called Central Park West. He also very nearly became Will in Will and Grace.
“I am very ambitious largely because I love to work," he says. “In fact, I'd go so far as to call myself a workaholic, but I've never taken myself overly seriously. I'm out there to have fun, and mostly that's exactly what I do have: an awful lot of fun."

John returned to British TV screens in 2005 when Russell T. Davies revived everyone's favourite childhood show, Doctor Who. He played Captain Jack Harkness, an omnisexual time traveller, former conman and nothing less than an immortal being. He infused the role with such enthusiasm and devilish glee - boasting a twinkle in the eye that worked on many levels, not all of them obvious - that before long Davies was writing a spin-off series especially for him, Torchwood. The first series was a huge critical and commercial success; the second arrives on BBC2 in early 2008. Not for nothing, then, does John consider that, right now,
“all my multiple dreams are coming true. It really has been a rollercoaster ride of late," he says, “and I'm terribly grateful for all the opportunities I've had. I'm enjoying every last minute of it. But right now, I'd like to concentrate on the music. Singing was always something I was going to return to in some shape or form, and it feels like an entirely natural progression for me to do this album here and now. I'd love to tour it as well, because there is nothing better than going out to meet your audience night after night. And who will they be? Well, I'm hoping for everyone, because I really do feel that there is something on this record for everybody, so hopefully I'll be playing to young and old alike, and everything in between."

Ultimately, he says in conclusion, he does love a challenge, and then promptly rising to it. And John Barrowman has conquered so much in his career to date: the big screen, the small screen, Broadway and the West End, and now, imminently, the charts.
“When you put it like that," he says, the roguish smile returning and lighting up his face like electricity, “it makes me sound like I've achieved rather a lot, doesn't it?"

It does indeed. And the good news? There's more to come.

“Oh, I'm not finished yet,” he says. “Not by a long shot.”