Mo'Nique

Monique Angela Hicks (née Imes; born December 11, 1967), known mononymously as Mo'Nique, is an American stand-up comedian and actress.

She has received various accolades, including an Academy Award, BAFTA Award, Golden Globe Award, and Screen Actors Guild Award, as well as nominations for a Primetime Emmy Award and a Grammy Award.

Mo'Nique first gained recognition for her work in stand-up comedy, debuting as a member of The Queens of Comedy.

Mo'Nique was born on December 11, 1967, in Woodlawn, Baltimore County, Maryland, the daughter of engineer Alice Imes and drug counselor Steven Imes Jr. She is the youngest of four children.

Mo'Nique graduated from Milford Mill High School in Baltimore County in 1985 and attended Morgan State University.

She is a 1987 graduate of the Broadcasting Institute of Maryland.

Before she was an actress, Monique worked as a customer service representative at the phone company MCI in Hunt Valley, Maryland.

She got her start in comedy at the downtown Baltimore Comedy Factory Outlet when her brother Steve dared her to perform at an open mic night.

She began her transition into mainstream film and television having a starring role as Nicole "Nikki" Parker in the UPN series The Parkers (1999–2004), as well as appearing in Phat Girlz (2006) and Welcome Home Roscoe Jenkins (2008).

Mo'Nique portrayed Nicole "Nikki" Parker on the UPN television series The Parkers from 1999 to 2004.

She was featured on many leading stand-up venues such as Showtime at the Apollo, Russell Simmons' Def Comedy Jam, and Thank God You're Here.

Mo'Nique tackles race issues in her stand up routines, for instance at the Montreal Just For Laugh Festival in 2000: "White and black people, we're just mad at each other, we don't know why we're mad at each other. We're not each other's enemy. We're not the enemy. It's the Chinese people we need to watch out for".

In 2002, she received a nomination for the Grammy Award for Best Comedy Album.

Mo'Nique's first play was Eve Ensler's Obie Award-winning production of The Vagina Monologues in March 2002.

Mo'Nique, Ella Joyce (Roc); Wendy Raquel Robinson (The Steve Harvey Show and The Game) and Vanessa Bell Calloway (What's Love Got to Do with It), were the first all black celebrity cast to perform The Vagina Monologues.

Produced by YYP & Associates, the show was directed by playwright and director Yetta Young as well as co-produced by Kellie R. Griffin, Lisa D. Washington and Anita Cal. Mo'Nique is the author of the best-selling book Skinny Women Are Evil: Notes of a Big Girl in a Small-Minded World.

She hosted the 2003 and 2004 BET Awards and appeared as the host again for the 2007 BET Awards.

She received positive responses in July 2004 with her opening performance of Beyoncé's single "Crazy in Love" In 2007, she performed Beyoncé's "Déjà Vu".

After her twin boys were born in 2005, Mo'Nique cut off all contact with Gerald.

In 2005, Mo'Nique played a significant role in Tony Scott's thriller Domino, co-starring Keira Knightley and Mickey Rourke.

In 2006, Mo'Nique was cast as the lead in Phat Girlz, a comedy about an aspiring fashion designer struggling to find love and acceptance.

The film was met with lukewarm response from critics and fans.

It did earn back its $3 million production cost in its first weekend of release.

She also released a 2006 cookbook called Skinny Cooks Can't Be Trusted.

Mo'Nique was part of the Washington, D.C., WHUR radio show with George Wilborn.

In 2006, she occasionally filled in for afternoon personality Michael Baisden when his contract with ABC Radio was in the process of getting renewed.

She was also named hostess of Showtime at the Apollo. She was the hostess and executive producer of Mo'Nique's Fat Chance, a beauty pageant for plus-sized women, on the Oxygen cable network.

She hosted the first season of Flavor of Love Girls: Charm School on VH1 where she crowned Saaphyri as the winner.

Mo'Nique's 2007 documentary I Coulda Been Your Cellmate! focuses on incarcerated women.

In interviews with individual women, she touches on the common factors that bring many women into the penal system.

The documentary was related to her filming a comedy special at the Ohio Reformatory for Women, also known as The Farm.

In 2007, she had a guest-starring role on the hit television series Ugly Betty as L'Amanda, Mode's weekend security guard.

She starred in The Mo'Nique Show, her own late-night talk show.

During a 2008 Essence magazine interview, Mo'Nique revealed that she was sexually abused by her brother Gerald from ages 7 to 11; he went on to sexually abuse another girl and was sentenced to 12 years in prison.

In 2009, Mo'Nique garnered critical acclaim for her performance in the film Precious, for which she won numerous awards, including the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress, becoming the fourth African-American woman to win the award.

She has since hosted The Mo'Nique Show (2009–2011), and starred as Ma Rainey in the HBO biopic Bessie (2015), earning a Primetime Emmy Award nomination.

Taped in Atlanta, the show premiered October 5, 2009, on BET.

She was featured in soul singer Anthony Hamilton's video "Sista Big Bones", the second single from his album Ain't Nobody Worryin'.

On April 19, 2010, he admitted on Oprah to sexually abusing her over several years.

He also was abused by family members and struggled with substance abuse.