T4

<body topmargin=0 leftmargin=0 marginheight=0 marginwidth=0> <table cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 border=0 height="100%"><tr> <td valign="top" width=97 BGCOLOR="#FFFFFF" TEXT="#080000"> <div> <B><IMG SRC="a854e6b0.jpg" border=0 width="78" height="107" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></B></div> <bR> <div> <B>MENU</B></div> <div> <A HREF="index.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Ricki Online"><U><B>What's New?</B></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id8.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Transcripts"><U><B>Transcripts</B></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id3.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Biography"><U><B>Biography</B></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id2.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Filmography"><U><B>Filmography</B></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id9.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Image Gallery"><U><B>Photo Gallery</B></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id42.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="The Ricki Lake Image Index"><U><B>Ricki Lake Show Image Archives</B></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="index.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Ricki Online"><U><B>Ricki Reviews</B></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id6.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="TV Schedule"><U><B>TV Schedule</B></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id4.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="About the Site"><U><B>About Ricki Online</B></U></A><A HREF="id4.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="About the Site"><U><B> Site</B></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id10.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Quiz"><U><B>Quiz</B></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id5.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Links"><U><B>Links</B></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id7.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Copyright Terms of Use"><U><B>Terms of Use</B></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="http://www.rickiworld.com/" TARGET="_top" TITLE="http://www.rickiworld.com/"><U><B>Ricki World</B></U></A></div> <bR> <bR> <bR> <bR> <div>  </div> <bR> </td> <td valign="top" BGCOLOR="#FFFFFF" TEXT="#080000"> <div> <TABLE BORDER="1" CELLPADDING="1" CELLSPACING="1" WIDTH="689" BORDERCOLORLIGHT="#FFFFFF" BORDERCOLORDARK="#FFFFFF" FRAME="BOX" RULES="ALL" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0" > <tR> <tD VALIGN=TOP HEIGHT= 913 WIDTH="532"><div> redhotricki</div> <div> BY LINDA FRIEDMAN</div> <bR> <div> It's a half hour before airtime at the Ricki Lake show in New York City. Backstage, jittery guests are getting their makeup done. Stressed out staffers are checking there schedules. And the host's mutt, Dudley, is chasing her owner around the dressing room, where she'll choose her outfit for the first of the day's two shows.  In the center of all the commotion, 26-year-old Ricki Lake is totally calm, "Getting up in front of people doesn't make me nervous," she swears.  "It never has."</div> <div>      The Ricki Lake show is the second-most-popular daytime talk show on TV. Five days a week, sometimes twice a day, more than five million fans are glued to the tube.  And with juicy topics entitled "Mom, When My Boyfriend Gets Out of Jail, I'm Taking Him Back" and "Surprise...I Want to Sleep With You," it's hooking more viewers by the minute.</div> <div>      What is it about Ricki that makes guests willing to spill their guts in front of a national audience? "They relate to me," says Ricki.  "I'm not trying to be something I'm not.  I guess they feel like they know me and that they can confide in me."</div> <bR> <div> <B>The fat years</B></div> <div> Ricki grew up in Hastings-on-Hudson, New York, with her parents and a younger sister, Jennifer.  Ricki showed an early interest in performing--at age 13 she was already auditioning for commercials--and transferred to the Professional CHildren's School in New York City.  It was also about then that she began gaining some serious weight.  And by the time she started classes at Ithaca College in upstate New York, the five-foot-four inch freshman had ballooned to almost 200 pounds.</div> <div>      Around this time, Ricki got a lucky break--her weight actually helped her land plum roles in the movies Hairspray and CryBaby.  She bought a house in Los Angeles, and her future seemed set. </div> <div>      Except that she kept gaining weight, eventually hitting 250 pounds during a yearlong stint on the TV series China Beach.  By then, Ricki's roundness was no longer a laughing matter--her weight was killing her confidence, and offers for parts stopped coming her way.  Ricki felt as if she'd hit rock bottom.  Now, over lunch at a trendy but not too expensive cafe in New York City (Ricki's choice), she pulls out a picture of herself when she wore a size 24, "The fact that I'm foever trapped on film looking like that is frightening," she has said.</div> <div>      Between bites (she oreders pasta and barely finished half of it), Ricki describes how, four years ago, she decided to take comtrol of her weight and her life.  "It got to the point where nothing was going right--financially, emotionally, physically--and I felt like the only thing I could take control of was my body."  Ricki started eating smarter, cutting down on fat grams and portion size.  She permanently banned junk food fromher refrigerator so that she wouldn't be temped to snack.  And she added frequent exercise sessions to her daily routine.  Slowly and steadily , she began toning up and slimming down.</div> <bR> <div> <B>A babe is born</B></div> <div> Today Ricki weighs in at 125 poinds, half of her former weight ("It's so much more fun to go shopping for clothes in a size 10 than a size 24"), and she's still shrinking.  Her restored sense of self esteem must have come across in her 1993 audition for te talk show;  The newly confident and reduced size Ricki beat out more than 100 other candidates, including Melissa Rivers and supermodel Veronica Webb.  </div> <div>      It was a major turnaround for her career--but it  was only the beginning of her total life makeover.  A month after the show first aired, Ricki went to a Halloween party and met the guy of her dreams, illustrator Rob Sussman.  "I was talking to a friend of mine, I looked up, and I was basically like, Wow!" remembers Ricki.  Rob got up the nerve to come over and start a conversation.  They must have had a lot to talk about-the two ended up ditching the party and going out for a mega-romantic dinner. By the time their entrees arrived, Ricki and Rob were crushing on each other in a major way.</div> <div>      "I called my friend from a pay phone and said, 'I met the guy I'm gonna marry,' before I had even kissed him," says Ricki.  Sure enough, they exchanged vows in Las Vegas just five months later.</div> <div>      It's almost their one year anniversary, and they still can't keep their hands off each other (trust us, we witnessed some major PDAs when Rob stopped by Ricki's photo shoot). And when there not working, the two lovebirds do everything together, from taking art-history classes to getting arrested.  That's right.  Last year Ricki and Rob took part in an anti fur protest, and they wound up spending a night in jail, (Some people have accused Ricki of participating in the protest in order to stir up publicity for her show, a charge she hotly denies.)</div> <bR> <div> <B>Her next challenge</B></div> <div> As if a new job and a hunky husband weren't enough to keep her alendar full,  Ricki starts work, on a romantic comedy in May.  The film, Mrs. Winterbourne, is about a woman who falls in love with a dead guy (there's a major case of mistaken identity).  Ricki is thrilled by the prospect of playing the lead in a love story.  In fact, she wants to compete with stars like Winona Ryder and Marissa Tomei for Hollywood's sexiest roles.  She'd even like to belt out a few tunes on Broadway someday.</div> <div>      We have a feeling that Ricki is going to succeed at whatever she puts her mind to.  "I think having gone through that hard time when I wasn't psyched about my life has given me an appreciation for what I have today," says Ricki. " And I'm not going to blow it again." </div> <bR> </tD> <tD VALIGN=TOP><NOBR><bR> <div> <B><IMG SRC="0c939960.jpg" border=0 width="57" height="150" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></B></div> <bR> <div> <B><IMG SRC="0ca68960.jpg" border=0 width="104" height="150" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></B></div> <bR> <div> <B><IMG SRC="0cb69960.jpg" border=0 width="105" height="150" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></B></div> <bR> <div> <B><IMG SRC="0cc60960.jpg" border=0 width="96" height="150" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></B></div> <bR> </NOBR></tD> </tR> </TABLE></div> <bR> </td> </tr></table></body>