Sitcom draws out softer side of a pit-bull rapper

Last season, she sometimes felt like giving it up, but this season is going better.
By BRIDGET BYRNE
ASSOCIATED PRESS
LOS ANGELES -- Starring in her own sitcom allows Eve to reveal a side not usually associated with the hard-core rapper image that made her famous.
"The part that people know the least about her comes across most in this show: There's a seriously girlie-girl side to her," says co-star Jason George.
He cites her fondness for frilly slippers, little dogs and movies like "The Sound of Music" to explain the flip side of a woman who described herself as "a pit bull in a skirt" in one of her early raps.
Eve plays fashion designer Shelly Williams, the central character on UPN's "Eve" -- about a group of friends struggling with modern attitudes about romance. Now in its second season, the series airs Tuesdays at 8:30 p.m. Eastern.
When Eve first signed on to star in the series, "Eve" was titled "The Opposite Sex." She acknowledges being uncomfortable when the network decided to name it after her. "What if it fails and my name was on it?" she recalls thinking at the time.
The network eased her doubts, explaining the importance of letting audiences know it was her show and that viewers wouldn't find it confusing to have the title name not match the name of the main character. (Classic examples cited were "The Cosby Show," starring Bill Cosby as Dr. Cliff Huxtable, and "The Bob Newhart Show," in which Newhart played Dr. Robert Hartley.)
Discarded title
Eve, of course, is accustomed to name changes. Born Eve Jeffers 26 years ago in Philadelphia, when she first started rapping she was known as Eve of Destruction.
Then "I looked at myself as an artist and decided I didn't want any title," she explains. "I just wanted to be myself." So she settled on just one name, Eve, "the name my mother gave me."
Eve broke into hip-hop as a prot & eacute;g & eacute; of the gangsta rap pioneer Dr. Dre, and then the Ruff Ryders collective headed by ruffian DMX.
Afterward, she released three solo albums: "Let There Be Eve"; "Scorpion," which featured the 2001 Grammy-winning single "Let Me Blow Ya Mind," and "Eve-olution." This spring, she'll be cutting a new album and relaunching her fashion line, Fetish.
Eve's feature film experience includes Vin Diesel's action thriller "XXX" and the comedies "Barbershop" and "Barbershop 2." Now, she has a supporting role in Kevin Bacon's critically acclaimed "The Woodsman," which she believes "will open the doors" to other dramatic roles.
Sorting it out
After it was retitled "Eve," the sitcom shifted its focus a little, but at its heart, the show remains the dilemma of six friends -- three female, three male -- trying to make sense of their love lives and better understand the opposite sex.
Ali Landry plays Rita Lefleur and Natalie Desselle-Reid is Janie Egins, who are Shelly's girlfriends and co-workers in their Miami-based fashion business, DivaStyle.
The male leads are J.T. Hunter (George), a physical therapist and Shelly's ex-beau, and his boys, Brink (Sean Maguire), a trendy club manager, and Nick Delaney (Brian Hooks), an accountant searching for the perfect woman.
There's a great deal of laughter and chat on the stage at Sunset Gower Studios as the three woman rehearse a scene for an episode.
"We talk too much," Eve confessed, noting that, like kids misbehaving in class, they often need to be told to focus and stop their extracurricular fun.
Such on-set levity wasn't always the case for Eve.
"The first year was hell," she said. "It was torture. It was like being punished. I felt like I was in detention."
She found the five-day work week much different from making music in a recording studio where she could set her own schedules and be as late as she wanted.
It's been easier this second season. She's still working on her tardiness, but she's come to like the stability.
"It feels like 'Wow,' this is home," she said. "I love my cast, I love my crew . . . it's exciting. I'm having fun."
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