Definitely Right On

Queen Latifah started rapping when she was 17. Not immodestly, All Hail the Queen was the title of her debut album, released in 1989.

Her mother thought her stage name was pretentious and said, "Give me a break." But Latifah, now 28, recalls, "I stuck to my guns and it proved to be good."

The Grammy-winning rapper, who was born Dana Owens, said she picked Latifah from a book of Muslim names when she was 8. She was visiting relatives in Newark, N.J., and the book belonged to a cousin. "It meant delicate and sensitive. So I decided that would be my nickname."

When music caught her interest, she started making demos with the help of friends she met in the rap industry and finally scored with Princess of the Posse, which was shown on Yo! MTV Raps and led to a contract with Tommy Boy Records. She won a Grammy for best rap solo performance in the song U.N.I.T.Y. in 1995.

Rapping hasn't been her only gig. She starred in Living Single, a sitcom that ran for five seasons on the Fox network, and has starred in several films including Set It Off and Sphere, with Sharon Stone and Dustin Hoffman.

Set It Off came after a difficult period for Latifah. She was coping with the death of her brother, a car-jacking in which a friend was wounded, and her arrest during a traffic stop for gun and marijuana possession.

Her newest project, Order in the Court, is a CD on her own label, Flavor Unit, distributed by Motown.

She prefers the melodic cuts to the ones where phrases are delivered rapid-fire.

Listeners understand most of the quick raps right away, she says. "But everybody has to rewind on some of them. The clue to rap is you got to play it again and again, certain things you weren't sure you heard right."

Although Order in the Court isn't a "message-y" album "it's about making good, individual music, music that's a little different from everyone else out there" several tracks do have a message.

For example, she says What You Gonna Do is a song that means "at the end of the day, no matter what goes on ... all you have to do is pray on it. Find the light of God inside of you, because it is there."

From the Heart of a Queen is a book she's writing about self-esteem and self-respect. While not an autobiography, the book will draw on her experiences growing up in East Orange, N.J.

Latifah, whose build is generous on her 5-foot-10-inch frame, is quick to say she never starved herself, even in high school. "I was a good healthy eater. I also played basketball so I got exercise. Now I'm a little bit lazier than I used to be. I'm not exercising as much as I should right now. I'm trying to get back on track."

Women probably agonize about their looks more than men, she says. "Every woman is not a model. That's what you see on TV, perfect figres. My thing is, a perfect figure is what you have. Love the reality of what it looks like. Sometimes self-hate causes you to do so many things like starve yourself or overeat, things like that."

For her role as a deep-sea diver in Sphere, Latifah had to learn how to scuba. "My agent told them I could scuba. He had to get the gig," she says. "I knew I would pick it up pretty quickly. When I was 10, I was on a swim team in Newark for a little while. I've always been a good swimmer."

For her role as a lounge singer in the upcoming film, Living Out Loud, Latifah sings jazz.

Singing jazz professionally for the first time, Latifah says, "took a little rehearsal. I enjoyed it." She listened to several versions of Lush Life before she sang it and most liked Sarah Vaughan's version. She also liked Ruth Brown's Be Anything (But Be Mine).

Future plans include a movie about legendary blues singer Bessie Smith. "I'll have a lot of fun dancing and singing," she says.

Oh, yes, Smith, known as the queen of the blues, definitely was not skinny.

By Mary Campbell