Whenever the conversation comes up of who our favorite women in Hollywood are, you generally get the same answers: Beyoncé, Jennifer Lawrence, and Halle Berry. My answer requires absolutely no thought at all.
“Queen Latifah,” I say, “Queen Latifah is my wife forever.”
Now, I love Queen Latifah for the same reason people love their own favorites. She’s absolutely gorgeous, and just seeing her onscreen makes me happy. I admire her for much deeper reasons, too. On top of an incredibly diversified career, her personal brand has always stood for equality and self-empowerment, topics that are still relevant even to this day.
According to Biography, Queen Latifah was born Dana Elaine Owens in Newark, New Jersey. She grew up with an older brother, who later died in a motorcycle accident – she still wears his key around her neck to this day, and a mostly single mother, Rita.
She explained in an interview on the Howard Stern Show that her father, while not absent, was in and out of her life. She had aspirations to rap and produce from a young age, named herself Latifah after an Arabic word that means “delicate” and “kind,” and floated from girl group to girl group in the 80s before signing with Tommy Boy Music, and releasing her first album “All Hail to the Queen”. She formed her own record label Flavor Unit Records and Management Company in 1991, and won a Grammy Award for her signature song “U.N.I.T.Y.” in 1995.
It’s here that Latifah’s career exploded into the diverse collection it is now. In the 90's she began her acting career with a lead role in the sitcom “Living Single,” and a masterful dramatic performance as Cleo in the bank robbery film, “Set It Off," while still working on her hip hop career.
She had her own talk show in 1999 which she left voluntarily to pursue other projects, including a part in the musical film “Chicago”, for which she received an Academy Award nomination (the first for a female hip hop artist). She went on to star in a mix of comedic and dramatic acting roles while her musical style took a 180 turn as she began to record jazz albums, like the Grammy nominated “The Dana Owens Album.”
Latifah’s style was originally incredibly Afro-centric, featuring African-style clothing and Nefertiti-inspired headdresses. Around the 2000's, and along with the shift to jazz music, her style changed to a more glamorous – but still modest – beauty. The entire time, she never stopped advocating for women’s rights and fighting against domestic abuse, while still finding a way to stay out of the scrutiny that comes with her level of fame.
Queen Latifah became an immediate, recognizable brand over the years. Her CoverGirl modeling deal and collection as thrived for years now and in 2013. She started another talk show, “The Queen Latifah Show,” for which she won a People’s Choice Award for Choice Talk Show Host. Even when the show was cancelled in 2015, she continued moving forward, starring in 2015’s “Bessie” which garnered her some of the highest critical acclaim of her career.
Aside from the unprecedented variety of her career, and honestly, how many careers span from hip hop to jazz to musicals, one of Latifah’s best qualities has always been unapologetic self-confidence. In an interview with More magazine, she stressed the importance of a strong self image stating “When you try to be someone else, we don’t get you.” She has an established reputation as one of the most positive businesspeople in Hollywood, and is known for her incredible beauty – an incredible feat for a voluptuous African-American woman in Hollywood. She seems to float through her career with grace and an immeasurable level of chill.
In short, you can have the ever-changing “it girls” of Hollywood, I’ll stick with my ever-evolving yet effortlessly herself, Queen.
