A few weeks back, I was invited to be an audience member at the taping of the premiere episode of The Queen Latifah Show at Sony Studios in Culver City. I have only been to the taping of one show before and had a blast. I love Queen Latifah, so I said, YES, PLEASE! It was an incredible opportunity and they promised we wouldn’t be disappointed by the guest list. As promised, I was not disappointed one bit!

I’ve been waiting since August 23rd to share this with my readers. The guest was John Travolta. I was sitting maybe 20 feet away from Queen Latifah and John Travolta! It was such a surreal moment! It was an awesome time!

I was able to carpool from San Diego to the show with my friend and fellow blogger, Rory Hadley who blogs at Chocolate Hair/Vanilla Care. The conversation flowed and we were both excited to see the show. Rory’s a big fan of The Queen as well. She knew right where the studio was and I could hardly contain my excitement (Although, Rory remained calm. She’s great at remaining calm, even with my driving.).

We arrived on time and went through the security and then were escorted to the studio, across the lot and past many other studios. The inside of the studio was packed with other exuberant studio-audience-members-to-be. We were greeted by the producer, Gillian Sheldon, who was an absolute pleasure to meet and she spent some time chatting with the 6 of us bloggers about the show.

As bloggers, we got a VIP tour of the gorgeous set (How lucky are we?!), that was designed by none other than Lenny Kravitz. I love Lenny and think he’s so extremely talented, however, he really outdid himself on the design. It was LOVELY. Queen Latifah calls it “Big Sexy.” Will and Jada Pinkett-Smith are the executive producers, we learned during the tour of the set. We got to take pictures before the rest of the studio audience filed in and watched the crew getting set-up. What an incredible experience!

We went back to the waiting area with the rest of the crowd and waited for our group to be ushered to our seats. We were taken to the front row of the stands to wait for the show to start. Watching everyone on the set scramble around, in such a process of ordered chaos that it was difficult for me to comprehend how any television show makes it to the final cut. It was astonishing to me! Nevertheless, like a well-oiled machine. While we waited for the show to start, we were entertained by the funniest comedian, Ron G. He was damn funny and my side hurt by the time the show started!).

Eventually, it was time and the show began. Queen Latifah came out with an outfit identical to the one John Travolta wore on Saturday Night Fever. I swear, she’s even more beautiful in person than she is one television. Of course, she came out dancing and singing, Queen Latifah style. (She’s got some moves!) She’s is stunning and bubbly and down-to-Earth. You could tell that she is intensely enthusiastic and proud of her new show and I have to say, she has every right to be. It was a great show and I have every belief that she’ll be a success!

During the interview with John Travolta, he opened up about his family, his career and discussed what advice he would give to his younger self. I kept thinking to myself, “This is so weird. I am
close to Queen Latifah and John Travolta. I am not usually impressed by celebrity, nonetheless, this was an exception to the rule. The very best part, was in between the breaks, when she did her own thing—dancing, singing, talking to the audience. She put on quite a show! I think my hands hurt for a week from all the clapping I did.

I’d love to tell you more, however I know you’ll be tuning in to the first show, which airs next week AND I don’t want to spoil it for you. See if you can spot me in the audience, when the show premieres next week:

The Queen Latifah Show begins on September 16, every afternoon, Monday through Friday. You can click HERE to find the showtimes and stations in your area. You can find out more information about the show by visiting The Queen Latifah Show website: http://queenlatifah.com/

Disclaimer: I was invited to be a studio audience member for The Queen Latifah Show. I was not compensated for this experience and am sharing because I genuinely had an amazing time!