Queen Latifah

When did serial killing become a creative outlet?Movie serial killers are getting so elaborate that I half-expect Martha Stewart to inaugurate a new section of her magazine. It'll be called "Murdering," and it'll be devoted to decorating with letters and images clipped from newspapers and setting up sicko scavenger hunts to baffle smarty-pants detectives.In "The Bone Collector," Denzel Washington plays a smarty-pants detective, an ex-cop named Rhyme. An on-the-job accident left him motionless except for his neck and a finger, with which he operates a computer.

Is Billie Holiday one of the 100 greatest women of rock and roll?What about Mahalia Jackson? Tammy Wy-nette? Ella Fitzgerald?Not rock and rollers, you say? Well, what do you know? Because each of these legendary singers has a place in VH1's "100 Greatest Women of Rock and Roll," a five-part series airing on the cable channel this week.Jazz singer Holiday, in fact, is No. 6 on the list, perched right between singer/songwriter Joni Mitchell (No. 5) and Pretenders leader Chrissie Hynde (No. 7)

Here's how you spot a movie star: No matter how many actors are on the screen with her, no matter how much more technically prepared they may be, she commands the viewer's attention. When she's on, you never want her to leave; if she does, you want her to come back. The camera loves her; the movie curls up and dies without her.All of that describes Queen Latifah. Unfortunately, she is not the star of "Living Out Loud," Richard LaGravenese's contemporary romantic drama. That role is played by Holly Hunter, who delivers an oddly uneven performance of a recently divorced woman striking out on her own in New York.

There is a scene in the CBS miniseries "Mama Flora's Family" that features Flora Palmer (Cicely Tyson) at age 69 walking into a Tennessee coffee shop, attempting to integrate its lunch counter.As the scene started to unfold, my first thought was that I'd been here before. And I had, with Tyson as Miss Jane Pittman integrating a water fountain in the acclaimed 1974 made-for-TV movie, "The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman."And the model for Pittman, according to director John Korty, was Rosa Parks refusing to give up her seat on a bus.You might think that's bad: television just recycling the same stories over and over, seemingly with no new ideas.

HOLLYWOOD -- "Hey, Dana! How've you been?"Queen Latifah walks through the doors of Intermezzo, her favorite Melrose eatery, and warmly hugs Scotty Weber, the Italian restaurant's chef. Waiters and busboys also call her by her given name. "They spoil me here," she says with a wide smile.When the pressure's on and her stomach growls, Latifah often stops here, a place that offers her more than her favorite Caesar salad in Los Angeles. Intermezzo is her sanctuary, a place where she neither has to shoulder the responsibility of being in the public eye as the head of a rap management company, as a Grammy-winning rap artist, or as Khadijah, the lead character of Fox's popular sitcom "Living Single."

Family relationships get some scrutiny in several shows tonight, from conventional blood kinships to the artificial kind spliced together for network ratings. And one of the best PBS "Mystery!" sequences of recent years is back for a rerun.* "ABC Afterschool Special: Long Road Home" (4 p.m.-5 p.m., WMAR, Channel 2) -- Family stress and displacement are the issues, as a 16-year-old boy (Micah Dyer) meets his new stepmother (Kristen Cloke) and is shocked to learn she's just 28. They share a car trip of discovery from Los Angeles to Denver to join his father (Jameson Parker)

Less than two weeks from the Sept. 12 primary election to choose mayoral candidates in Baltimore, Maryland Public Television offers a debate among the hopefuls. The Fox network also begins a new season, as "Living Single" and "New York Undercover" return and "The Crew" makes its debut.* "Voters Ask: Baltimore Mayoral Debate" (7:30 p.m.-8:30 p.m., MPT, Channels 22, 67) -- The Democratic candidates engage in a live discussion, responding to questions from a news media panel. Mayor Kurt L. Schmoke and City Council President Mary Pat Clarke are close in the polls, and third candidate Kelley C. Brohawn is also participating.

Fox Broadcasting has finally become a full-time, seven-night-a-week TV network. But from the looks of the schedule it announced yesterday, Fox has had to take some of the edge off its cutting-edge approach to programming to do it.Fox will still be the youngest and most hip network by far next fall, with a new variety show from Robert Townsend and a sitcom featuring Queen Latifah among 11 new shows. But it will also have a sitcom featuring Don Rickles and a talk show with Chevy Chase, neither of whom are exactly twentysomething.

LOS ANGELES -- Queen Latifah says she's not confused about what's art and what's real life when she's playing Khadijah James in the new Fox sitcom, "My Girls.""Khadijah is Queen Latifah. She's me, except she's not known," Latifah said yesterday. "It's important for people to understand that.""My Girls" is an ensemble sitcom about four young, African-American women living together in Brooklyn. Think of it as an urban, African-American "Designing Women" for twentysomethings.Khadijah, the publisher of a small magazine, is a kind of hip housemother to her roommates, who are played by Kim Coles ("In Living Color")

NEW YORK -- A woman in black rushed up to Todd Oldham as he entered the paint-by-numbers show at the Bridgewater Lustberg gallery in SoHo a few weeks ago. "Of course, you'd be here," she chirped, throwing an air kiss to the 30-year-old designer. "Your work is so kitschy."Mr. Oldham, a native Texan who can look like a wholesome farm boy one minute and a Joe Orton punk the next, smiled his best Opie smile and walked away, slightly irked."Congratulations, you star," said Kachin Kobayashi, a fashion stylist.

Queen Latifah sued by makeup artist, stylist A makeup artist and a fashion stylist claim in coordinated lawsuits that they got ugly treatment from Queen Latifah when she cheated them out of $1 million. Celebrity cosmetology consultant Roxanna Floyd says she lost $700,000 when the rapper-actress failed to pay her for work she did between July 2005 and February 2008. In a separate lawsuit, celebrity fashion stylist Susan Moses said she was cheated out of $300,000 during the same period.

Starring Dakota Fanning, Queen Latifah, Jennifer Hudson. Written and directed by Gina Prince-Blythewood. Released by 20th Century Fox. $29.99 (Blu-ray $39.95) *** 1/2 Sue Monk Kidd's novel The Secret Life of Bees, the story of a runaway young white girl in the '60s-era South who finds a loving surrogate family in the guise of three black sisters raising honey, has become a much-loved staple of high-school reading lists. Writer-director Gina Prince-Blythewood's film adaptation should disappoint none of the book's fans.

Showing no signs of a sophomore slump, Damages returns tonight as the creators of the legal drama intensify their intricate thriller. Emmy winner Glenn Close is back in the hot seat as big-time litigator Patty Hewes. After defeating billionaire Arthur Frobisher (Ted Danson), the steely Hewes plunges into a new battle, weathers personal anguish and finds a vast conspiracy. Patty's protege, Ellen Parsons (Rose Byrne), seethes over Frobisher, blaming him for her fiance's slaying. Ellen also has become an FBI informant to take down Patty, and no wonder: Patty put out a hit on Ellen.

Love and family may not be able to overcome everything, but you couldn't prove that by The Secret Life of Bees, a refreshingly clear-headed film version of Sue Monk Kidd's best-selling novel (and high-school reading-list staple) that soars on the strength of strong acting and a script that stubbornly refuses to go all sappy and preachy. Set in the early-'60s South, at a pivotal time when the civil rights era is going to either take hold or be forced into submission, the story centers on 14-year-old Lily Owens (Dakota Fanning)

There's a robbery going on in Mad Money, but it has nothing to do with what happens in the movie. The pleasures of this slight caper film are strictly small-screen, as three talented actresses walk through quaint roles before they hurry on to the next project. Mad Money (Millennium Films) Starring Diane Keaton, Queen Latifah, Katie Holmes. Directed by Callie Khouri. Rated PG-13. Time 104 minutes. Online Watch a preview and see more photos from Mad Money at baltimoresun.com/madmoney

Oh Zip Seven, Soon to Be in annual Heaven (Unless a rather hotter Destination Awaits its date of clinical Expiration). But not yet -before such regret Mark this merry day of joy unwrapping, Stockings unhung, ribbons flapping, Squeals and songs and bells a-clapping, A succulent feast, a dash of night-capping. This is when, in busted rhythm, We hail our friends, and all that's with 'em. So holiday greetings to Mayor Ms. Sheila, To Andy McPhail, who we hope will reveal a Penchant for plotting a pennant, O!

Queen Latifah was in Maryland in October, giving concerts at the Music Center at Strathmore in North Bethesda and at Baltimore's Lyric Opera House as part of the Sheroes program, which honored women for their community service in the Baltimore area. Here are some things you might not know if you didn't see Latifah perform: She likes to relate to her audiences by playing up her homegrown roots. She spent many a day in Edgewood, where she has relatives, including her grandmother. Her father was backstage at both shows.

FILM EYES WITHOUT A FACE / / 2:30 a.m. Monday. Turner Classic Movies. ....................... Get into the Halloween spirit early with TCM's wee-small-hours-of-the-morning screening of Georges Franju's 1959 Eyes Without a Face (or, better yet, TiVo it). It's a hyperaesthetic horror classic with more impact than any gorefest. Like some exotic arachnid, it transfixes, then stings you. Pierre Brasseur stars as a surgeon who lays waste to one young beauty after another as he attempts to replace his daughter's face -- totaled in a car accident -- with massive skin grafts.

No one since Alec Guinness has done a better job of acting the lonely guy in a crowd than Will Ferrell in the marvelous, marvelously imperfect new comedy, Stranger than Fiction. It's been called Ferrell's variation on Jim Carrey's The Truman Show, a chance for a wild farceur to rein himself in. Stranger than Fiction (Columbia Pictures) Starring Will Ferrell, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Dustin Hoffman, Queen Latifah, Emma Thompson. Directed by Marc Forster. Rated PG-13. Time 113 minutes.

Sounds of the Underground Tour -- Merriweather Post Pavilion / Catch a variety of bands, including As I Lay Dying, In Flames, Trivium, Cannibal Corpse, Gwar, Terror, Black Dahlia Murder, Behemoth, the Chariot, Evergreen Terrorist and Through the Eyes of the Dead, in Columbia Monday. Gates open at noon, and tickets are $29.50. Merriweather is on Little Patuxent Parkway. For tickets, call 410-547-SEAT or go to ticketmaster.com. Tristan Prettyman -- Rams Head Tavern / Singer/songwriter Tristan Prettyman, who performs at Ram's Head Tavern in Annapolis tonight, got her first wave of inspiration from an Ani DiFranco cassette.