A chat w/Rikki Lake at the "Hairspray" screening...

The rain threatened to soak the outdoor screening of "Hairspray" last night at a park near Palm Springs High School. It was a sing-along event with the lyrics scrolled across the screen just in case you didn't know the words. Nikki Blonsky had been scheduled to introduce the film but she had fallen ill. So stepping in at the last minute was the original Tracy Turnblad herself...Rikki Lake!

I had a quick gab with Rikki (pictured above with Amanda Bynes) who showed up just an hour before she had to dash off to a nearby theater to introduce her new film "The Business of Being Born." While she was the star of the original "Hairspray" film, she only has a small role in the new version.

"It was nice to be included and I sang on the soundtrack which was really thrilling for me as a singer. I was a trained singer before I was an actress. To be recognized that way and to be remembered and just be a part of it was a really exciting thing for me, To go on the set, to meet the new Tracy..it's almost like coming full circle."

I asked Rikki if she realized that an issue of US Weekly last year with her on the cover detailing her weight loss was one of the biggest sellers in the history of the magazine: "I heard. I think we're a weight-obsessed society and I am just as implicated as the next person. I want to know what the next craze of losing weight or looking young or looking better is. But I was certainly surprised by the reaction."

I ask Rikki, who has been quite low-profile in recent years, if the magazine sales are just an indication of the connection she still has with people who connected with her in the first "Hairspray" then through her long-running talk show.
"I purposely was laying low for a few years making ["The Business of Being Born"] with my director Abby Epstein. We've been working on this for three-plus years. Now I'm coming out with something new and something to say as a filmmaker. It's just the icing on the cake - ;life just gets better. I am so grateful for every twist and turn my career has taken from meeting John Waters to doing the talk show to doing all the films and now making a documentary about something really important. Life really doesn't suck."