Former EastEnders actress Martine McCutcheon is set to begin shooting a new film with Hollywood actors Hugh Grant and Colin Firth.
The 26-year-old will team up with Notting Hill and Four Weddings And A Funeral writer Richard Curtis in the romantic comedy Love Actually, about a British prime minister who falls for his Cockney cleaner.
"We start shooting next month, and I'm so excited," she told S - the Sunday Express magazine.
"When the offer came through I couldn't believe it. I thought I'd never get these opportunities again.
"I was really despondent and it was getting too much for me. I was seriously thinking of relocating to Spain, and I was literally carrying my passport around in my bag."
Ill-health dogged much of her time in the West End where she was forced to cancel 100 performances when she appeared as Eliza Doolittle in My Fair Lady at the National Theatre.
McCutcheon, who is currently recording her third album with a variety of special guests from the UK and US ready for release later this year, is also set to star in a Carlton TV spectacular, joining other international stars.
Martine to play cockney sparrow
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