By Karen Butler

Basically, it s just about these four animals that were living in the comfort of a zoo and they get shipped away and get stranded on an island in the wild where they have to learn how to take care of themselves and they have to depend on each other and help take care of one another, explains the former Miss Maryland. Jada is a very serious woman known for her activism, observes Smith s co-star, Chris Rock. But she s really funny, too. She doesn t really get to show her funny side a lot. She was in Ali. She was in Collateral. She can knock out the drama with the best of them, but she s a funny chick. It s nice. You can feel this personality come through in the character in this movie. He s right, agrees the mother of three. I don t get a chance to show that side of myself. People always think of me as tough, but I m really funny and nice. I can be that. Gloria gives me a little bit of both tough and funny.

Asked if she had any reservations playing a hefty hippopotamus in the flick, the petite actress who got her start on the classic 80s comedy, A Different World, says she never gave the character s size or shape a second thought. When (DreamWorks chief) Jeffrey (Katzenberg) showed me the picture of Gloria I was like, you know, Yeah, she is a hippo, Smith recalls. I'm playing a character, and she's an adorable one. So, it just never occurred to me that that was something I should be like concerned about. I would say Gloria is the mama, she offers. She looks at Alex and the gang as being her boys and she has this maternal thing about her, but she also has this tough-love approach. She s very just lovable, very likable, I think and she s a cutie booty.

Smith says that in reading her part of the script, she was more taken by Gloria s warmth and ability to take charge in a crisis, than worried about what she looked like. For Gloria, I really enjoyed how maternal she was. She's kind of a mama that has a tough love approach, but she's still there, Smith notes. You know, she has a lot of love for her friends. So, I liked that. As Smith was busy recording her lines for her character, animators were hard at work to make her on-screen alter-ego look and act like her portrayer. A lot of the eye movement, Smith says when asked what about Gloria most looks like her. And the different positions of my head. I realized, Oh, I do that in movies, too. So, there were definitely a lot of movement things. Of course, the actress also got a kick out of the film s heart and humor, even in scenes that did not directly focus on her character.

I thought the funniest concept was that Marty didn t know if he was black with white stripes or white with black stripes, Smith laughs. I thought that was hilarious. The actress, who worked on the film over the past several years and who also has a music CD slated for release this summer, says she tried to keep her role as Gloria a secret from her kids until the project was completed. They actually found out I was doing Madagascar by watching a video that had a trailer for it on it, she reveals. I didn't say anything. They were like, Mommy, you re playing a hippo! And I was like, Damn, I was trying to wait and make it a surprise. So, they are very excited. I told them I was (going to do interviews,) and they thought that we were having the premiere and they were all upset. (They said,) You are supposed to be taking us! But I said, It is just press, it is not going to be the movie. So, they are looking forward to it. They are very, very excited.

Hired in part for her own feisty attitude, Smith admits she wasn t initially sure she could play a part in a movie primarily geared towards children. At first, I was like: Uh, animation. I don t know if I have kid sensibility, she confides And Jeffrey was like, I really think this would be a good project, and I said, OK. And, so, I m really happy that I decided to come aboard and it s just a matter of me paying attention to some of the jokes I was doing. It was just a little adult. I had to just pull it back a little bit, but thats just my sensibility.

Once she got the tone of the character right, Smith set to work learning how to act without the benefit of any sets, costumes, props or other actors!It's just kind of throwing a bunch of lines out and trying different stuff, she says of recording her Madagascar lines. It's a pretty challenging process, just because there is no one there and you dont have any sets or props or anything. So, you are trying some different lines, some different interpretations. And then they put it together really fantastically.

MADAGASCAR IN THEATRES MAY 27