Meet the Celebrity Big Brother 2010 housemates

The New Year welcomes or should that be grimaces the return of Channel Four’s Celebrity Big Brother for one last run of celebrity voyeurism.

After weeks of speculation, the final line-up has been revealed in all it’s mainly d-list glory. Read after the jump to check out who we’ll be getting to know more of for the next 27 days…

Stephen Baldwin

Best known for his roles in double Academy Award-winning The Usual Suspects and Oscar winning Born on the 4th of July,  the 43-year-old actor is the youngest of the Baldwin brothers, who include Daniel, William and the most famous sibling, 30 Rock star Alec.

A born-again Christian, Stephen is also the director of his own ministry – The Breakthrough Ministry – preaching in arenas across the United States. His faith has spurred him to write a book entitled Unusual Suspect in which he describes how he has dedicated his life to Jesus

Nicola T

Croydon born Nicola launched her modelling career in 2002 winning The Sun’s first ever Page 3 Idol competition.

The 27-year-old previously dated Fulham Striker Bobby Zamora, during which time she took part in reality show WAGs Boutique where two teams of WAGs competed to run two fashion boutiques over a three-month period.

Other on-screen credits include an appearance as a red light district girl in film Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo and launching a fitness DVD titled WAG’s Workout with fellow WAGS Melissa Johnson and Lisa Munday.

Nicola is now engaged to Crewe Alexander midfielder Simon Walter with whom she has a daughter, Poppy. She has recently collaborated on a single with ex-CBB Housemate Coolio.

Stephanie Beacham

Stephanie’s first claim to fame came as a 21-year-old when she was chosen to play a nude scene alongside Marlon Brando. The 60-year-old has had an extensive film, television and theatre career on both sides of the Atlantic, she has previously been nominated for a Golden Globe and a People’s Choice Award.

In 2007 Stephanie took part in the BBC’s Strictly Come Dancing and in early 2009 joined the cast of Coronation Street as Martha, the love interest of Ken Barlow.

Alex Reid

Best known for dating model Katie Price aka Jordan, cage fighter Alex is trained in numerous martial arts including ‘Vale Tudo’ which he describes as “as near as you can get to total mayhem in a controlled environment” The 34-year-olds first cage fighting experience came at Extreme Brawl in 1998, while his lifetime ambition is to be Middleweight Champion of the world.

Outside cage fighting, Alex joined the elite 10th Para regiment of the Territorial Army in 1996 and is said to enjoy reading up on philosophy and ancient mythology. He has also had walk on roles in films such as Eyes Wide Shut, Judge Dredd, Sliding Doors and Tomorrow Never Dies. A regular in ITV’s Soldier Soldier, he appeared in Hollyoaks between 2001 and 2002 before leaving the series to concentrate on his cage fighting career.

Lady Sovereign

Inspired by the success of Ms Dynamite, Lady Sovereign reportedly began writing raps at 14 and uploading them to a So Solid Crew fan forum. Online she met DJ Frampster and together they started uploading sets as the garage/grime duo, Heavy Like Dat.

In 2005 she met Jay-Z, then president and CEO of Def Jam, who asked her to perform an on-the-spot freestyle, it is rumoured that the 24-year-old was immediately signed to the label although has since parted company.

Lady Sovereign or Sov as she prefers to be called has had success both in the UK and US and now has her own record label through which she has recently released a new album.

Dane Bowers

Former member of boy-band Another Level, Dane achieved seven top ten singles including a number one with Freak Me. After the group split in 2000, the 30-year-old fronted UK garage act Truesteppers, who had a hit with Out Of Your Mind featuring the first solo outing of Victoria Beckham.

Dane has a son with ex-girlfriend Emma-Jane North and had a well publicised relationship with model Katie Price. He is currently single.

Sisqó

The former lead singer of now-defunct R&B group Dru Hill, the 31-year-old left in 1999 to pursue a solo career.

His first solo album Unleash the Dragon which included hit The Thong Song launched Sisqó into a household name. The album went five-times Platinum and accrued world wide sales of 6 million. His follow up album, Return of the Dragon had also achieved wide-acclaim.

As well as his music career, Sisqó has taken on supporting roles in the films Get Over It with Kirsten Dunst and Snow Dogs in which he stars as a dental assistant with Cuba Gooding, Jr. He also had a role in the hit television series Sabrina, the Teenage Witch in 2001.

Jonas aka Basshunter

Swedish born Jonas Altberg is best known for his number one dance hit Now You’re Gone. The song subsequently reached number one on the UK Singles chart and stayed there for 5 weeks making it the biggest selling dance single of 2008.

The  25-year-old makes music under his stage name – Basshunter, his album Now You’re Gone: The Album was released in July 2008 and went directly to No1 in the UK and sold gold and platinum in several countries around the world.

Heidi Fleiss

Known for running an extremely successful yet illegal prostitution ring, Heidi was arrested in 1993 on multiple charges. The media reports of her arrest catapulted the 44-year-old into the limelight as ‘a Hollywood Madam’ although to this day she refuses to name her clients.

Her well publicised 1994 trial resulted in a documentary about her past career. After a spell behind bars Heidi sold the rights to her life story to Hollywood, the result was a made-for-TV-movie called Call Me: the Rise and Fall of Heidi Fleiss.

She has since produced a DVD with Victoria Sellers aptly named Sex Tips and has gone on to develop various other business interests including running a Laundromat called Dirty Laundry in Nevada.

Katia Ivanova

Born in Kazakhstan, 21-year-old model, Ekaterina moved to Britain at the age of three, coming to fame as the girlfriend of Rolling Stone, Ronnie Wood.

After meeting 62-year-old Wood at a Mayfair bar in 2008, Ekaterina reportedly described their relationship as starting off “like a fairytale”. After splitting at the end of 2009 however she claimed in an interview “I think he needed to be mothered….I thought ‘I’m only 21, why should I sit here and worry about him?”

Known as Katia to her friends it is reported that she dreams of being a children’s illustrator.

Vinnie Jones

One of the 20th century’s most notorious footballers, Vinnie rose to fame playing for Wimbledon FC, his most infamous moment involving the grabbing of Paul Gascoignes’ crotch during a game against Tottenham. The 44-year-old was sent off 12 times in his career and still holds the record for the fastest ever booking – receiving a yellow card after just three seconds. Vinnie went on to play for clubs including Leeds, Chelsea, and Wales. He retired from the game in 1999.

After football, his great passion is acting and in 1998 he made his successful debut as ‘Big Chris’ in Guy Ritchie’s hit film, Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, for which he received an Empire award. Hollywood soon beckoned and Vinnie appeared in a variety of films including Gone in Sixty Seconds, Swordfish, Mean Machine and X-Men: The Last Stand.

So there you have it…let the tears, tantrums and breakdowns commence…