Anika Noni Rose is now a Disney princess in the new animated feature "The Princess and the Frog." And not just Disney's first of the American variety, but its first black princess. "My grandma was at the premiere with me; she's 90-plus. You have no idea how amazing it is to be able to give this to her," said the star. Once a queen of San Francisco stages, then a conquering heroine on Broadway and a bona fide Dreamgirl, the 37-year-old, honey-voiced performer wasn't conjured by magic to appear in Disney cartoons. The Connecticut native got there by way of the Bay Area -- first via ACT, then acclaimed local productions including "Valley Song" at Berkeley Repertory Theatre. After "Caroline" came the much-ballyhooed film of "Dreamgirls" and a couple of miniseries before Rose leapt back to movies as the voice of Tiana for "Princess and the Frog." The new feature is a New Orleans-set, Jazz Age riff on "The Frog Prince" in which aspiring restaurateur Tiana and a spoiled visiting prince find themselves devolved into anthropomorphized amphibians by bad voodoo. The cast fortuitously includes Keith David, John Goodman and Oprah Winfrey. "The Princess and the Frog" opens in Los Angeles and New York on Nov. 25 and the rest of the country on Dec. 11. Sources: Xinhua
