Queen Latifah To Star In New CBS Drama

GRAMMY® winning artist, Queen Latifah has signed on to star as Mali Anderson in new CBS drama based on the Harlem super-sleuth mystery novels written by Grace F. Edwards. Latifah’s character is a street and book smart graduate student who works towards her PHD in Social Work, while solving neighborhood murders and crimes involving close […]

GRAMMY® winning artist, Queen Latifah has

signed on to star as Mali Anderson in new CBS drama based on the Harlem super-sleuth

mystery novels written by Grace F. Edwards.

Latifah’s character is a street and book

smart graduate student who works towards her PHD in Social Work, while solving

neighborhood murders and crimes involving close friends and family. Born Dana

Owens, she adapted the name Latifah, which in Arabic means “delicate and

sensitive.”

Latifah is also executive producing the project

with Lawrence Bender and Kevin Brown. Queen Latifah’s production company Flavor

Unit and Bender and Brown’s Bender-Brown Prods. are producing.

"We look at this as an opportunity to do

an extraordinary television series with an extraordinary, unique talent in Queen

Latifah, who has such broad appeal because of her acting and her music,"

Brown told the Hollywood Reporter.

Latifah gained the distinction of being the first

female solo rap artist to achieve gold record status. Boasting a strong female

consciousness that spread like wildfire, Latifah’s material oftentimes addressed

political and feminist issues.

In addition to Queen Latifah’s new role

on CBS, her greatest hits collection She’s A Queen, will be released

on October 29.