Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, December 17, 1993 TAG: 9312180009
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: TODD CAMP FORT WORTH STAR-TELEGRAM
DATELINE: LOS ANGELES LENGTH: Long
Now, after a successful flirtation with the film world in movies like ``The Fisher King,'' ``Soapdish,'' ``Sister Act'' and now ``Sister Act 2: Back in the Habit,'' the 36-year-old Najimy says she wants to return to the political stage that made her a star.
``I was an activist before I was an actress,'' Najimy said. ``So I'm not one of those hip actresses who's decided to become political in the middle of my career. I did it when it wasn't fashionable, when my mother was saying, `When are you gonna stop?'''
Najimy fights for a number of causes, the biggest of which is AIDS.
``The projects that I work for are rights - women's rights, animal rights, gay and lesbian rights - and you can't have rights if you're dead,'' Najimy said. ``So I've made AIDS my priority, since it's life or death. I do a lot of work for AIDS because I have to and we all have to. It's not something we can choose to not think about or be apathetic about. We have to pay attention. I had a friend die two days ago, and it comes up and slaps me in the face every single day.''
Najimy's interest in show business dates back to childhood, when she would dance for her family.
``I'm Lebanese, so I was Arabic-dancing at home for money for my relatives,'' Najimy said. ``I liked the attention from that. I liked raising my hand in class. I remember my first real performance. I was in second grade, and I stood up in front of the PTA and read a poem about Abraham Lincoln. I loved the power of having people listen to you on stage. Later on, as a young adult, I chose theater and acting as a way to express my political feelings.''
Najimy found an audience for her opinions when she created ``The Kathy and Mo Show,'' with her friend Mo Gaffney. In a two-hour-plus program that had the two performers doing more than 15 characters apiece, the production managed to take a humorous yet hard look at serious subjects like feminism, homosexuality and discrimination. The show became an off-Broadway hit, earning Najimy an Obie Award. It sparked a successful HBO special and has continued to run on stage for more than six years.
``Because of the success of `The Kathy and Mo Show,' I got asked to do all these movies, which maybe isn't how I saw my career going at all,'' Najimy said. ``But it's the way it's gone, and now it's going to take a little turn back the other way for a while.''
Najimy made her motion picture debut as a video store customer in a brief but memorable scene from Terry Gilliam's ``The Fisher King.'' ``I just had one scene, but it was so much fun. I remember at the time going, `Absolutely, movies. Yes!'''
And movies followed. Bit parts in films like ``Soapdish,'' ``This Is My Life'' and ``The Hard Way'' helped set the stage until a role in the hit comedy ``Sister Act'' made her a star.
As the eternally perky Sister Mary Patrick, Najimy struck a chord with audiences and critics around the country. ``People always ask me if I'm really that cheerful,'' she said of her character. ``If I was that cheerful, I would blow up.''
It's a miracle she was able to muster up any cheer, considering the conditions under which the first nun comedy was made.
``Touchstone called me while I was doing `The Kathy and Mo Show' in San Francisco,'' Najimy recalled. ``So this is what I would do. I would do the show, then at 11 o'clock at night I would get on a flight to Los Angeles. The next day, I would go in for an audition or screen test - I did five of them - then at around 3 or 4 o'clock, get on a plane, get back a half hour before ``Kathy and Mo'' and then do that.''
She said that once she was cast, the schedule continued, with her rehearsing in L.A. during the day and flying back to San Francisco every night to do the show.
``It was amazing. I thought, `How can you do it?''' Najimy said. ``And then I thought, `The only way you can do it is just not think about it and do it!' It was crazy. But I have to say I thought it was exciting and a little bit fun.''
She followed up ``Sister Act'' with her first major supporting role in Disney's witchy comedy, ``Hocus Pocus.'' But has it all been fun?
``No, some of it's fun. Some of it's horrific,'' she said. ``I don't want to be like a whiny actress or anything, but `Hocus Pocus' was a very long shoot, too long for something that was so one-dimensional. I think if it had been a film where we were exploring deep things, it would have been OK. But being kooky witches for six months was really tiresome.
``Most of it, though, is really a fantasy life,'' Najimy continued. ``I don't have to work a job. It's fine, it's just within your little life, you have crises and problems and things to overcome, and now I'm really committed to taking some time off and doing a different kind of project.''
Najimy says she plans to produce another ``Kathy and Mo'' special for HBO, collecting the set pieces not shown in the first special.
``I worked real hard on `Kathy and Mo,' It was heavy-duty, intense. I was responsible for every aspect of it, so the movies were a departure from that specific kind of responsibility,'' Najimy said. ``I only had to be the character I was going to be within the ensemble of the piece. I didn't have to worry about the writing, production or anything. But now I'm ready to turn back and take on a little more responsibility in the projects that I do.''
Some of those projects include the published version of the ``Kathy And Mo'' script, due in bookstores next year. In stores now, she's contributed a chapter to ``The Choices We Made,'' a collection of essays by Hollywood women who have had abortions.
In July, she'll appear in an American version of the British film ``Antonio and Jane,'' and she just finished a special on the life of Dr. Seuss for TNT that should hit TV screens next Thanksgiving. Until then, Najimy plans to devote time to working on another one-woman show called ``My Body Is Not My Instrument.''
by CNB