By Karu F. Daniels, AOL Black Voices,
David Livingston/Getty Images
Holly Robinson Peete has designs on ‘Super Bowl XL’ with her seventh annual Gridiron Glamour benefit event.
For Peetes’ Sake
Holly Robinson Peete is bringing her humanitarian spirit to the Motor City for ‘Super Bowl XL.’ The veteran actress and her husband Rodney Peete, former NFL quarterback and host of ‘Best Damn Sports Show Period,’ will present ‘Gridiron Glamour,’ the seventh annual charity fashion show and benefit brunch at the Ritz Carlton in Dearborn, Michigan on Feb. 4. Over the years, ‘Gridiron Glamour’ has raised more than $500,000 for breast cancer awareness and education. "Philanthropy is so noble,” Robinson Peete told Black Voices last week. “It balances you and helps you keep a really healthy perspective on everything.”
The star of UPN’s ‘Love, Inc.’ formed the HollyRod Foundation in honor of her late father, Matthew T. Robinson, Jr. who succumbed to Parkinson’s disease after a twenty-year fight. “One of the most indescribably exhilarating feelings is one of giving back and impacting people's lives in a positive way, however slight.” And Mrs. Robinson Peete also has an affinity for sports –outside of marrying a renowned athlete. The ‘Head of the Class’ star recently added author to her portfolio with the release of ‘Get Your Own Damn Beer, I'm Watching the Game!: A Woman's Guide to Loving Pro Football.’ “I love the adrenalin rush -the fierce competition-the game faces, the gossip!” she added. “Sports is a metaphor for life-train hard, work hard, focus and you win."
West On King
With eight Grammy Award nominations, Kanye West is on everyone’s radar this season. The multi-platinum selling rapper/producer appears on ‘The Ellen DeGeneress Show’ on Jan. 16 and discusses the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. “Well, with both of my parents being activists they would teach me a lot about him and how he took a positive approach to breaking down the barriers of racism,” West stated. “And, so many schools are named after him and he’s just the most popular and one of the successful and impacting freedom fighters and it sound cliché but if it wasn’t for him I may not be on this TV show in the same capacity I am today.”
TV Land ‘Talking’
The TV Land network will kick off the three-part series ‘That’s What I’m Talking About,’ on Feb. 1 at 10 p.m. ET/PT. Hosted and moderated by comedian and actor Wayne Brady, each 60-minute installment –airing every Wednesday-- features a lively discussion where Hollywood notables, athletes, politicians, journalists, musicians, writers and comics such as Harry Belafonte, Diahann Carroll, Paul Mooney, Spike Lee, Al Sharpton, Wanda Sykes, John Ridley, Greg Anthony, Lola Ogunnaike, DL Hughley, Nia Long and more debate the various aspects of perceptions about African-Americans both on and off screen. The series is co-produced by Tonya Lewis Lee, who helmed last year’s critically acclaimed series ‘Miracle’s Boys’ on 'The N’ network.
One In A Million
Tom Joyner’s interactive website BlackAmericaWeb.com has reached a milestone of one million registered members. The lifestyle website is promoted prominently on Joyner’s nationally syndicated morning radio program, which airs in 115 markets and heard by an estimated eight million listeners. The web site was launched in June 2001 and also produces a weekly newsletter boasting a circulation of 500,000.
Music For ‘Madea’
Motown Records will release the soundtrack to Tyler Perry’s forthcoming Lionsgate movie ‘Madea’s Family Reunion,’ on Feb. 21. In preparation for the soundtrack release, the Sylvia Rhone-helmed label is promoting the Brian McKnight ballad, “Find Myself in You.” The soundtrack contains new songs from LL Cool J, Mary Mary, Chaka Khan, Johnny Gill, KEM, Gerald Levert, Yolanda Adams, Rachelle Ferrell, and Carl Thomas. Al Green’s classic ‘Love And Happiness’ and The O’Jays’ ubiquitous anthem ‘Family Reunion’ rounds out the 10-track set. The film, starring Blair Underwood, Lynn Whitfield, Boris Kodjoe, Henry Simmons, Maya Angelou, Rochelle Ayers, Jenifer Lewis, and Cicely Tyson, opens nationwide opening on Feb. 24.
’Dream’ Lives On
On Feb. 1, “The Dream: Martin Luther King, Jr., and the Speech that Inspired a Nation” will be released, which takes a closer look at his legendary “I Have a Dream” speech. Acclaimed scholar Drew D. Hansen roots out the literary, theological and political sources that converged to make the speech so monumental, throughout the book. “The contribution of the 'I Have a Dream' speech to America's transformation was not apparent at first,” Hansen writes. “But on August 28, 1963, King began the long-overdue process of changing America's idea of itself. He gave the nation a vocabulary to express what was happening in the civil rights revolution
