MAY 2008 - EBONY MAGAZINE: PARENTING

MOMS ON A MISSION: For 3 actresses, charity may begin at home, but it doesn't end there. By Shirley Henderson

Being a leading lady is one thing. However, being a mother is quite a different role. Just ask celebrity moms Karyn Parsons, Sheryl Lee Ralph and Jasmine Guy, who have all played divas during their careers. Motherhood for each actress seems to have sparked a greater awareness of the issues that many parents face. Parsons, who played Hilary Banks on The Fresh Prince of BeI-Air, has started her own company, Sweet Blackberry, to proeducational DVDs for children. original Dreamgirls alum and activist, has established Divas Simply Singing!, a foundation that raises funds for HIV/AIDS education. And Guy, who was cast as Whitley Gilbert on TV's A Different World. has worked closely with youth at A Place Called Home, located in South Central Los Angeles.

Actress Karyn Parsons says that she does not miss playing the sell'indulgent diva Hilary Banks, s on The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, which aired from 1990 to 1996. It could be that she is too busy juggling play dates in the park for daughter Lana, 4, and son Nico, 10 months, to reminisce about her narcissistic television character.

In addition to parenting, these days Parsons is thinking about education. In fact, while she was filming Fresh Prince, her mother, who then worked as a librarian, would call her with Black history stories. "She told me this story of Henry (Box) Brown," recalls Parsons, now 41. "I had never heard the true story of a slave who mailed himself in a box from Virginia [a slave state] to Pennsylvania [a non-slave state]. When [the box was] opened, he was a free man because he was in a free state."

She felt then that the story would well-suited for a children's book and began to compile similar stories. In 2003 Parsons married Alexandre Rockwell and started a family.

"When I was pregnant with my daughter, my husband got on me about the project. He said, 'You know, this is really important,'" she recalls. "I was thinking about my own responsibilities as a parent that were coming up, and teaching my daughter about her heritage."

In 2004 Parsons started Sweet Blackberry, a production company based in New York, where she and her family live. She's written and produced two animated films that are available on DVD. They include the historical story of Brown and another on Garrett Morgan, the inventor of the traffic light. Queen Latifah narrates the film that focuses on Morgan.

"Every kid who I know, regardless of how much technological advances we have, wants to be read to," she says. "So we developed these little films that feel like someone is reading to you."

She says that the stories are meant to be a fun way to teach children about their history, "especially about Black Americans who we don't hear about so much. If young people get interested early," she emphasizes, "it's something that will stay with them for a lifetime."