With Susan Taylor and MC Lyte
ESSENCE CARES Witnessing the desperate cry for help from our children, from poverty, infant mortality, incarceration, HIV/AIDS and homicide, Essence magazine has launched the Essence Cares Initiative at this year’s Essence Festival. The goal is to reach over 3 days the 250,000 who will attend the empowerment sessions, concerts and ask for everyone to commit to work with trusted organizations to mentor and strengthen our youth. I was fortunate enough to have been asked to be part of the PSA that included Oprah, Danny Glover, Mariah Carey, Sean Diddy Combs, Spike Lee, MC Lyte and many others. I’m in! You can help too. Support: NAACP, The Urban League, The Legal Defense Fund, Children Defense Fund, MAD DADS, The United Negro College Fund, Big Brothers/Big Sisters of America and Operation Hope.
With friends Eva and Naomi at the Oprah Show
THE OPRAH SHOW AND THE BEAUTY OF COLOR I appeared on the Oprah show to promote my new beauty book The Beauty of Color with a little help from my friends Eva Mendes and Naomi Campbell who appear in the book as well. They helped supervise 3 makeovers using IMAN Cosmetics on 3 well deserving women and it was a glorious show ….. they even surprised me with a an interview by Naomi as she considers me her Legend! What an honor and that is how I kickstarted my book tour….. That’s what friends are for…. Thank you Eva and Naomi.
With Michelle and Barack Obama, US Senator for Illinois, and Leontyne Price
ONE WORD, OPRAH! Only Oprah could have orchestrated such an amazing once in a lifetime event. A Bridge to Now… A Celebration for ‘Remarkable Women during Remarkable Times’ was a 3 day event called simply by her as LEGENDS WEEKEND, May 13-15, 2005 in Santa Barbara, where she has a home. It was a weekend to honor those women who came before us and has made it possible for us women now to reap the benefit of their strength, determination and pure survival. 25 women were honored and here are their names… Dr. Maya Angelou, Shirley Caesar, Diahann Carroll, Elizabeth Catlett, Ruby Dee, Katharine Dunham, Roberta Flack, Aretha Franklin, Nikki Giovanni, Dr. Dorothy Height, Lena Horne, Coretta Scott King, Gladys Knight, Patti Labelle, Dr. Toni Morrison, Rosa Parks, Leontyne Price, Della Reese, Diana Ross, Naomi Sims, Tina Turner,Cicely Tyson, Alice Walker, Dionne Warwick and Nancy Wilson. Thank you Oprah for inviting me to be part of this historical celebration.
