According to Alicia Keys, she's taken a short break from music to launch an acting career, as well as record a song for the new James Bond film. She manages to steal a few scenes in her new movie, "The Secret Life Of Bees," which opens this week.
Keys told the Sun Times that she can't think about music just yet: "Damn! I can only do one thing at a time. I will soon [work on a new album]. I also love acting. My mom [Terria Joseph] is an actress and I grew up in the theater."
"My mom always did, Off-Broadway, so I was always in the world and I loved it. I acted before I sang and I did "The Cosby Show" and small roles. But the music came first. It's part of my essence. I knew I would evolve into acting."
Set in the segregated south of the 1960s, 'The Secret Life of Bees' is based on Sue Monk Kidd's 2002 best seller. It also stars Dakota Fanning, Jennifer Hudson, Sophie Okonedo, Queen Latifah, and Paul Bettany.
Fanning plays a runaway who flees from her abusive father with her nanny, played by Hudson, who's in trouble with the law. They go to a bee farm run by Latifah's character (the Queen Bee!), and her sisters, played by Sophie and Alicia.
Keys said of the role: "I just fell in love with it. I love the depth of it. It (black life) is not just one way. Yes, it was very violent [in the 60s], but there also were people who started their own businesses and really helped to move forward the nation. I think you're able to feel that as well."
While in Toronto to promote the movie, Keys also shot a video for the theme song for 'Quantum of Solace', the James Bond movie being released in November.
"It's called Another Way to Die," she says of the song she performs with Jack White of the White Stripes. "It feels very Bond, really brash and hard, super cool."
But as for the film, she says, "'Quantum of Solace' is a dope title... I have no idea what it means."
