Hot V.W.

Spencer Patterson

Friday, Sept. 23, 2005 | 9:11 a.m.

Vanessa Williams has recorded No. 1 hits, acted in blockbuster films and earned a Tony Award on Broadway, but her latest venture offered an opportunity to showcase yet one more performing talent.

"I play a hotel owner (in new TV series "South Beach"), and in the episode we're working on this week I get a chance to salsa dance," Williams said. "They know I love salsa, so the writers gave me a salsa episode. I get a chance to dance and do what I love."

More than two decades into Williams' career, that type of diversity keeps the entertainment field exciting for the 42-year-old New York native.

"It's always great to be able to incorporate multifacets of a career, to be doing it all," Williams said from a condo in Miami, where she will continue filming "South Beach" through late January.

"I think of myself as a performer, an artist. I've trained in a lot of different mediums, so to be able to utilize each of them is fantastic."

Tonight at 8 Williams steps back into the musical arena when she performs on the floating stage in Reflection Bay at Lake Las Vegas, the finale of the venue's "Stars on the Lake" summer concert series.

For part of her set, Williams will be backed by the Las Vegas Philharmonic. Williams' producer/arranger Rob Mathes was scheduled to rehearse with the symphony orchestra prior to showtime.

"That's kind of a treat, not just doing my regular set with my band, but having the added orchestra element," Williams said.

Tonight's material is expected to include some of Williams' best-known charting hits such as 1988's "The Right Stuff," 1992's "Save the Best for Last" and 1995's "Colors of the Wind" along with cuts from her January release, "Everlasting Love."

On that album, Williams covers a collection of 1970s love songs, including the Isley Brothers' "Harvest For the World," Stevie Wonder's "Send One Your Love" and Chaka Khan's "Everlasting Love," (original recorded when Khan was a member of R&B group Rufus).

While most songs on the disc are Williams' personal favorites, the vocalist speaks particularly fondly of the Khan tune, and its place in her nightly show.

"When I do 'Everlasting Love' I talk about the first time I saw Chaka in concert and what she was wearing and how awesome it was and how it changed my life," Williams said. "And how this is about as close as I'll ever get to being Chaka Khan."

A 15-time Grammy nominee who has sold more than six million albums, Williams has also made quite a name for herself as an actress.

She has appeared in such films as "Eraser" (with Arnold Schwarzenegger), "Shaft" and last year's "Johnson Family Vacation." And she has made her mark in the theater, appearing in productions including "Kiss of the Spiderwoman" and garnering a Tony nomination for her role in 2002's "Into the Woods."

Now she turns to television, and her first role as a series regular after several previous guest spots. "South Beach" is expected to join UPN's lineup around midseason.

"It's a great and unique setup because we're shooting on location, I would say, about 80 percent of the time," Williams said. "So we're really in the middle of South Beach, which is exciting and different not seen a lot on TV.

"Instead of being in a court room or a police precinct, you get out and see a lot of exotic people and a lot or different cultures. And hopefully that will set it apart from other things that are on TV."

Williams also stars in an independent film in post-production, "My Brother," the tale of two impoverished young brothers, one of whom is developmentally disabled.

But Williams' celebrity has come at a price. Her marriage to former NBA player Rick Fox has become tabloid fodder, with rumors of infidelity on his part and divorce proceedings which might or might not have been called off last year.

Williams declined to comment on the state of the relationship: "I have nothing to say."

Personal inquiries are hardly new for Williams, though. She dealt with her first such media blitz in 1984, when she was crowned the 56th Miss America, then was forced to relinquish the title when a nude pictorial -- shot before she entered the contest -- surfaced in Penthouse magazine.

That experience was tough for Williams on two fronts, one when the first black Miss America began receiving threats from white supremacist groups.

"I got letters. I had security issues. I had armed guards outside a motel when I was staying in Alabama," Williams said. "That was a reality back then."

Then, of course, Williams had to overcome the scandal that ensued when she became the first Miss America to lose the crown.

"To be respected in an industry with the label of a beauty queen was a hurdle enough, but to be a dethroned beauty queen was even more of a struggle," she said. "But it was my path, my journey, and 22 years later I can look back and see how it changed my life.

"There are fighters and there are those who aren't. That's the kind of person I was born to be. I come from strong stuff."