Freema Agyeman

Freema Agyeman is a British actress who is known for playing Martha Jones in the BBC science fiction series Doctor Who and its spinoff series Torchwood. Following her departure from Doctor Who and guest spots in BBC programme Little Dorrit, Agyeman held a starring role as Alesha Phillips in the crime procedural drama Law amp Order UK between 2009 and 2012. In 2013, she made her US television debut on The CWs teen drama The Carrie Diaries as Larissa Loughlin, a style editor at Interview magazine. Other television appearances include Old Jacks Boat, Silent Witness, Survivors and the Netflix drama Sense8. Agyemen also appeared as Penny in the 2015 film North v South.

Agyeman was born in London. Her mother, Azar, is Iranian, and her father, Osei, is Ghanaian. They divorced when she was a child. Agyeman has an older sister, Leila, and a younger brother, Dominic. Although her mother is Muslim and her father Methodist, Agyeman grew up to be a practising Roman Catholic. Agyeman attended Our Ladys Convent RC High School, a Catholic school in Stamford Hill and during the summer of 1996 she studied at the Anna Scher Theatre School in Islington and studied performing arts and drama at Middlesex University, graduating in 2000. Agyeman has martial arts skills, which prompted speculation that she would bring a more physical approach to the role of the Doctors companion. The tattoo Agyeman has on her upper arm is symbolic of her ancestry, containing the Persian word raha, meaning free, under an image of a butterfly. Agyeman endorses Divine Chocolate, a fairtrade corporation that works with Ghanaian cocoa farmers.

Source: Wikipedia