Mel B

Melanie “Mel B” Brown was “Scary Spice” in the ‘90s girl group the Spice Girls. The group’s first single, “Wannabe,” garnered international popularity and their album Spice (1996) went No. 1 around the world. Mel B made her solo debut in 1998 with the single “I Want You Back.” Her 2000 debut solo album, Hot, produced hit singles “Tell Me” and “Feel So Good,” and she released her second album, L.A. State of Mind, in 2005.

Mel B established herself as a television personality in 2007, participating in the fifth season of Dancing With the Stars. She served as a judge on the Australia and U.K. versions of The X Factor from 2011 to 2016, as well as America’s Got Talent, The Voice Kids Australia, The Masked Singer Australia and Queen of the Universe.

The singer was previously married to Jimmy Gulzar, with whom she shares daughter Phoenix, from 1998 to 2000. Mel B moved on with Max Beesley, whom she dated from 2000 to 2002, before dating Christine Crokos from 2002 to 2006. She briefly dated Eddie Murphy, splitting in December 2006. The pair’s daughter Angel was born in April 2007, two months before Mel B secretly married Stephen Belafonte in Las Vegas. After welcoming daughter Madison in 2011, Mel B and Belafonte separated in 2016. She filed for divorce in 2017, accusing Belafonte of emotional and physical abuse. Their divorce was finalized later that year, and Belafonte received custody of their daughter since she is an American citizen. Mel B got engaged to Rory McPhee in 2022.