Lela Rochon

Actress Lela Rochon started her career in show business as a bikini-clad party girl in Spuds MacKenzie beer commercials during the '80s. A trained dancer, she was in the background of Breakin', Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo, and Lionel Richie's music video for "All Night Long." In 1985, she starred in her first feature, A Bunny's Tale, a TV-movie starring Kirstie Alley as feminist activist Gloria Steinem during her Playboy Bunny days. Rochon went on to appear in the low-budget movies Stewardess Schooland Foxtrap, as well as the Eddie Murphy blockbusters Harlem Nights and Boomerang. Her big film breakthrough came in 1995, when her friendship with author Terry McMillan helped her to get an audition with director Forest Whitaker for the role of Robin in Waiting to Exhale. The film was a surprise Hollywood hit and Rochon was offered several new projects. After joining the cast of the WB series The Wayans Bros. as Shawn Wayans' girlfriend Lisa, she starred opposite Timothy Hutton in the made-for-cable movie Mr. and Mrs. Loving. She showed her versatility in her next few films as a wide array of characters: an exotic dancer in Gang Related, a government aide in The Chamber, a schoolteacher in Why Do Fools Fall in Love, a corporate vice president in Knock Off, and a kooky best friend in Labor Pains. In 2001, she joined the cast of the Lifetime original series The Division as Inspector Angela Reide. She and her husband, director Antoine Fuqua, have two children.

~ Andrea LeVasseur, All Movie Guide