Although she’s steadily built a career playing sweet and extremely likeable parts in films like "High School High," "Sunset Park," and "A Thin Line Between Love and Hate," actress Malinda Williams is beginning to shift her career into high gear. 1999 was a very good year for the coy, but seductive New Jersey native, whose big heart-shaped eyes and lithe hourglass figure caused hearts to flutter in the coming of age drama, "The Wood". The actress also married her long time sweet heart, actor Mekhi Phiffer, and gave birth to their first child, a boy named Omi (which in Yoruba means "spirit protected"). Now that she’s a wife and mother Malinda is looking to break away from ingénue types, and move on to more mature roles. "I want to play someone who people love to hate," she says while maneuvering through busy LA traffic. "The idea role for me would be to play a contemporary black woman who is successfully living her life and doing her thing a midst all the daily madness."

It looks like she’s getting her wish. Cast as "Bird," the loveable, but rambunctious baby sister in the Showtime family drama "Soul Food," Malinda is excited about the new opportunities that working as a series regular will present. "Playing Bird is giving me the chance to play a character that’s rarely seen on TV," she says. "I was looking to play someone whose life is complex and real, and that’s Bird. She’s a multi-dimensional woman trying to balance the challenges of marriage, family and career; which is certainly something that a lot of black women can relate to. I think she’s going to give voice to a type of woman rarely seen in the medium."

Malinda is equally busy in film as well. Upcoming she plays an actress in Reggie "Rock" Blythewood’s Hollywood satire "Dancing in September," and a stalker victim (opposite Mekhi) in "An Invited Guest". Lately, however the actress has begun to refocus her priorities closer to home. "Being married and having a baby really changes your priorities," she says. "I love my career and work as an actress, but nothing beats the feeling I have when I’m with Mekhi and Omi. It’s funny because in a lot of ways I’m just like Bird. We both want a family and a career. I guess we want it all; and you know what with a little help from God we’re going to get it."

LL Cool J continues to forge a career for himself in Hollywood. The always personable actor/rapper recently will soon star in a remake to the 1986 action pic "Rollerblade". L.L. also makes a memorable cameo in the upcoming Columbia/Tri-Star film "Charlie’s Angels".
With an all-star cast and a smorgasbord of lavish cuisine Trimark Pictures’ "What’s Cooking? humorously explores the modern American family, following four multigenerational families (African American, Vietnamese, Jewish and Latino) as they celebrate Thanksgiving, the most American of holidays. From the rich and successful Williams (Alfre Woodard and Dennis Haysbert) to the newly emigrate Trinh Nguyen (Joan Chen), the chaos of the Seeligs (Lanie Kazan, Maury Chaykin, Kyra Sedgwick and Julianna Margulies), and the internal furor of the Avilas (Mercedes Ruel and Douglass Spain), these families all contend with similar household issues as the prepare for the onslaught of family and friends.

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