Gabrielle Union chooses to be choosy

Sept 7 2001

By Kelly Carter, USA TODAY

	Gabrielle Union became a model instead of a lawyer.

BEVERLY HILLS — Gabrielle Union stopped short last month while reading a script for a character who gets gang-raped. Thanks, but no thanks. It hit too close to home for the actress, who was raped nearly a decade ago.

"I'm successfully out of counseling. I don't want to go back in," Union, 28, says after lunch at a popular L.A. restaurant. "It could be a great role for someone else, but not for me."

With her star quickly rising in Hollywood, Union can afford to say no. She appears in Two Can Play That Game, opening today and starring Vivica A. Fox and Morris Chestnut. Union plays Conny, who steals the boyfriend (Chestnut) of her professional nemesis (Fox).

"I get to play a bitch who is unapologetic," the bubbly Union says with a laugh.

She is anything but apologetic when talking about her dark day in 1992 when she and another female employee prepared to close a Payless ShoeSource store in Pleasanton, Calif., where she had a summer job. An armed gunman robbed the store and forced Union in a storage area, where he raped and badly beat her.

"I don't mind talking about what happened, because it's going to help someone else," she says, turning serious. "It's going to make some mom in Jackson, Miss., say, 'Hold on. My daughter works down at the yogurt shop. She closes by herself. Let me see what security precautions are in place to make sure that she's safe.' I got off lucky. I'm alive. A lot of people are not so lucky."

(The assailant was a Payless employee from another store who, Union says, had robbed other locations and recently raped another woman. Because Payless had not informed its employees, Union sued the discount-shoe chain for gross negligence and received an undisclosed judgment. The rapist got 33 years.)

She's gotten on with her life and on May 5 married NFL running back Chris Howard, 26, who proposed six months after the couple met at a friend's party in 1999.

Acting was not on her things-to-do list. The 5-foot-7 beauty, who was born in Omaha but moved to Pleasanton when she was 8, interned at a modeling agency while studying sociology at UCLA. Next up was law school, or so she thought. When her internship ended in 1996, the agency asked if she would stay on as a model. Facing school loans, she said yes. Soon she began auditioning for TV shows and, on her first try, landed a guest role on Saved By the Bell.

"I felt like I was Marlon Brando," she says, flashing her wide, Julia Roberts-esque smile.

She quickly became part of the guest-spot clique, picking up gigs on shows such as Moesha, 7th Heaven, ER and Friends. Her big-screen debut came in 1999 in She's All That. Last year she replaced Fox in CBS' City of Angels, where she played Dr. Courtney Ellis, but the show was soon canceled. She stole the cheerleading hit Bring It On from Kirsten Dunst and played Chestnut's girlfriend in The Brothers.

"She just came on the scene and exploded," says Game writer/director Mark Brown. "I think she has a very promising future, certainly as a leading lady. She has star appeal."

While many black actresses struggle to find work, there seems to be no drought for Union, who recently nabbed her first starring role in Deliver Us From Eva, a romantic comedy written and directed by The Brothers' Gary Hardwick. She's already wrapped Abandon, which marks the directorial debut for Academy Award-winning screenwriter Stephen Gaghan (Traffic), and Welcome to Collinwood, executive-produced by Oscar-winning director Steven Soderbergh (Traffic) and George Clooney. Both hit theaters in 2002.

"There are a lot of things that I have not gotten," says Union, who coveted The Matrix sequels role that went to the late Aaliyah. "Things that I thought I was settling on have turned out to be pretty big hits. I feel really blessed that people have responded so well to the projects and my work."

Thanks as always to Shannalou_99