Queen Latifah’s Top 10 Must-Watch Movies and TV Shows That Defined Her Legendary Career!

The best Queen Latifah movies and TV shows came after she had already established a solid career as a rapper in the early 1990s. Latifah released her debut album in 1989 when she was only 19 called All Hail the Queen, a release that topped out at sixth on the U.S. R&B and Hip-Hop Charts. By 1993, she had released three albums, with her third, Black Reign, certified gold and hitting 60th on the Billboard 200 albums chart. This led to her dipping her toes in Hollywood, and while she kept rapping, acting took the lead in her career.

Her first movie role actually came in 1991 when she was 21, and she took on a small role in the Spike Lee movie Jungle Fever as a waitress named Lashawn. This led to more movie roles before she enjoyed her breakout in the 1993 television series, Living Single. After a five-season run on the show, her career exploded, with roles in movies like Bringing Down the House, Barbershop 2: Back in Business, Last Holiday, Hairspray, Girl’s Trip, and her successful TV adaptation of The Equalizer.

10Bringing Down The House (2003)

Charlene Morton

Bringing Down the House allowed Queen Latifah to share the big screen with one of the world’s greatest comic actors, Steve Martin. In this film, Martin is Peter Sanderson, a workaholic tax attorney who is separated from his wife and has no time for his kids. He sets out on a blind date with a woman he has been talking to online. However, when the woman shows up, she is nothing like she looked like in their messages and is a felon who started chatting with him while she was in prison, lying the entire time.

Queen Latifah plays Charlene Morton, the woman in question, and Peter offers to help her expunge her criminal record, but this creates new problems between him and his estranged wife (Jean Smart). The film received mostly poor reviews from critics, but audiences seemed to enjoy it as Queen Latifah received honors at the Teen Choice Awards (Choice Movie Actress Comedy) and the NAACP Image Awards (Outstanding Actress in a Motion Picture). She also received an MTV Movie Award nomination.

9Star (2016-2019)

Carlotta Brown

Queen Latifah has starred in several TV shows over the years, and one that isn’t talked about as much is the music drama series Star. Airing on Fox from 2016 to 2019, the show follows three young singers who are seeking to become stars in the music industry. Those three musicians are Jude Demorest (Star Davis), Brittany O’Grady (Simone Davis-Rivera), and Ryan Destiny (Alex Crane Jones). Star Davis is the main character, an orphan who leaves her foster home and wants to make it in the world.

Queen Latifah stars in the Fox series as Carlotta Renee Brown, a woman who owns a beauty salon and worked with Star’s mother, Mary, in an R&B duo before she died. She serves as the surrogate mother of the three youngsters, although she doesn’t approve of their musical career aspirations. Co-created by Lee Daniels (Empire), the series lasted for three seasons and earned awards recognition at the Teen Choice Awards and GLAAD Media Awards

8Beauty Shop (2005)

Gina Norris

Barbershop was a successful comedy-drama starring Ice Cube as Calvin Palmer Jr., which followed a team of barbers at a local barber shop trying to survive the gentrification of South Chicago. The movie was a huge success and spawned a sequel that saw the introduction of a beauty shop next door where Calvin’s ex-lover Gina (Queen Latifah) works. The beauty shop women stole the show in the sequel, and they got a spin-off movie to themselves in 2005.

The cast of Beauty Shop also included Alicia Silverstone, Mena Suvari, Djimon Jounsou, Alfre Woodard, Andie MacDowell, and Kevin Bacon. The film didn’t have as much box office success, and it received mostly negative reviews. However, critics praised Queen Latifah’s lead performance, and she went on to want nominations at the Black Reel Awards, BET Awards, and the NAACP Awards. This also marked the end of the franchise until a third Barbershop movie came out 11 years later.

7The Secret Life Of Bees (2008)

August Boatwright

In 2008, Queen Latifah took on the lead role in a drama movie called The Secret Life of Bees​​​​​​. The film stars Dakota Fanning as Lily Owens, a 14-year-old living with her abusive father (Paul Bettany), who often only finds compassion and love from her dad’s maid, Rosaleen (Jennifer Hudson). After some racists beat Rosaleen for trying to register to vote, she runs with Lily to the home of August Boatwright, a successful beekeeper, played by Queen Latifah.

The Secret Life of Bees takes place in the 1960s and focuses on segregation and hateful racism that often led to violence and more, with the film mostly showing this through the eyes of a child. However, it was Queen Latifah who received the highest praise for her role as the strong woman who not only refused to give in to racial prejudices but also fought to protect even young white girls like Lily and her mother before her. The film won Outstanding Motion Picture at the NAACP Image Awards.

6Stranger Than Fiction (2006)

Penny Escher

Will Ferrell had a chance to take on a very different role when he starred in the Marc Forster fantasy comedy Stranger Than Fiction in 2006. While Ferrell was mostly known at the time for his broad slapstick comedies like Anchorman and Talladega Nights, this was a more nuanced comedy similar to the change that Jim Carrey attempted in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. In Stranger Than Fiction, Ferrell is Harold Crick, an IRS agent who realizes one day that he is a fictional character in a novel.

He realizes this when he suddenly hears the author’s narration in a voiceover — a narration that indicates that Harold will die. From here, Harold sets out to figure out how he can save himself and if there is even a reason to go on living knowing you are just a character in someone else’s story. The movie had a modest box office success and received mostly positive reviews. Queen Latifah stars as Penny, an assistant helping the author finish the tragedy of Harold’s life.

5Hustle (2022)

Teresa Sugarman

In 2022, Adam Sandler continued his trend of making serious movies in between his broad comedies and released the sports drama Hustle on Netflix. The film stars Sandler as Stanley Sugerman, an international NBA court looking for players overseas. When he discovers a phenom in Spain, he offers him a chance to make it in the NBA and offers to represent him with a chance in the NBA Draft. After a lot of work, Sugarmen gets Bo Cruz into the NBA Draft Combine and secures his way back into the NBA as well.

Queen Latifah stars as Teresa Sugerman, Stanley’s wife and the mother of his child. The struggles for Sugerman also include his travels keeping him away from his wife and child, and this is just as important as Bo’s attempts to make it in the NBA to do well by his family. The movie was released on Netflix and received universal acclaim, with a 93% fresh Rotten Tomatoes score, and Latifah received a People’s Choice Award nomination for The Female Movie Star of 2022.