Queen Latifah

Few figures in rap can claim the kind of respect Queen Latifah commands. In the two years since her first album, "All Hail the Queen," came out, she has not only established herself as a hit-maker in her own right, but has made guest appearance on recordings by Monie Love and LeVert. Yet it isn't just her music that people admire -- it's also her dignity, intelligence and bearing. To female rappers, she's a source of inspiration; to males, she seems the definition of a sister.In fact, there's probably only one rap star who doesn't think she's the ideal female rapper: The Queen herself.

Dan Rodricks dropped by Phillips Harborplace on Sunday for a sweet good-bye to the Light Street Pavilion anchor restaurant. He wasn't the only one. Here's Rodricks' story about the people who showed up for the last day to reminisce about the celebrities that came through back in the go-go '80s, A-listers like Muhammad Ali, Queen Latifah andBrad Pitt. Later this fall, Phillips will open a new restaurant nearby in the Power Plant space forrmerly occupied by the ESPN Zone.

QUEEN LATIFAH has been proclaimed the monarch of female rap ever since the 1989 release of her first album, "All Hail the Queen," which some consider a feminist manifesto.Selling nearly 500,000 copies primarily to rap's hard-core audience, it has been one of the most influential rap collections of recent years and inspired many women to try rap. Latifah's latest album, "Nature of a Sista'," may extend her popularity into the pop mainstream.Born Dana Owens in a working-class East Orange, N.J., neighborhood, Latifah, 21, started rapping in her mid-teens.

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.

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."

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.

Queen Latifah can get a Golden Globe nomination with one musical number tied behind her back. She had to, since one of her big musical numbers in Chicago, which opened Friday and earned her a best supporting actress nomination, was dumped. "Class" is one of the crowd-pleasing numbers in the Broadway show on which Chicago is based, and you can spot the moment when Latifah and Catherine Zeta-Jones are about to sing it, but then the movie cuts away from them. "We shot it, we shot it," assures Latifah, by phone.

SUN SCORE: *1/2 HOLLYWOOD - The Cookout is half-baked. It starts out on a promising satirical note as likable Todd Anderson (portrayed by Storm P) becomes the New Jersey Nets' No. 1 NBA draft pick and signs a $30 million contract. He assures his no-nonsense mother Lady Em (Jenifer Lewis) that he's not going to change, but prompted by his gold-digging girlfriend Brittany (Meagan Good), he goes on an epic spending spree that includes a mansion with seven bedrooms and 10 baths in a gated community.

Fifteen years ago, back when she wore Afrocentric gear and dropped feminist rhymes, nobody would have guessed that Queen Latifah would become so ubiquitous. Whether she's rapping, acting in a sitcom or on the silver screen, writing and producing movie scripts, or smiling brightly in Cover Girl ads, the striking Newark, N.J. native wears many hats, often at the same time. Her grace and charisma make it all look effortless. Just this year, she has starred in two movies: Barbershop 2 and The Cookout.

Beauty Shop wastes an awful lot of talent, both by settling for the ordinary when it should be striving for something more, and by failing to resolve an apparent disconnect between those making the movie and those acting in it. Queen Latifah, reprising the role she originated in last year's Barbershop 2: Back In Business, is Gina, a hairstylist recently relocated from Chicago (where, presumably, Ice Cube and his Barbershop franchise are still holding forth)...

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.

Queen Latifah breezed onto the floor of the CoverGirl plant in Hunt Valley yesterday, tall and impressive, aglow in pinks and browns. She was there to take a look at CoverGirl's newest product, a line of cosmetics made especially for women of color - the Queen Collection - inspired by the rapper-turned-movie actress/jazz singer/makeup model herself. But her presence there had a greater impact. From the cheering and preening going on among the plant's employees, it was clear Queen Latifah's visit was a morale booster and an inspiration.

LOS ANGELES -- Queen Latifah in Last Holiday and the inspiring basketball squad of Glory Road will attempt to beat back the high-earning Hostel at the box office this weekend. The top 20 movies at U.S. and Canadian theaters Friday through Sunday, followed by distribution studio, gross, number of theater locations, average receipts per location, total gross and number of weeks in release, as compiled Monday by Exhibitor Relations Co. Inc. are:

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.