LALA TRIES TO BECOME AN ACTRESS ON LALA'S FULL COURT LIFE!

La La Anthony has something to prove.

After years of being a successful TV host, radio deejay and reality-show star, she wants to be known as an actress.

"I'm going to make it in that space," she says from Los Angeles, where she lives when she's not in New York with her husband, Knicks superstar Carmelo Anthony.

She's already working on the acting thing. She's in the midst of making "Act Like a Lady, Think Like a Man," a film based on the popular book by Steve Harvey.

And, starting Oct. 5, she begins a run in the Off-Broadway production of "Love, Loss and What I Wore" at the Westside Theatre.

The shift hasn't been easy, though. Hollywood is prone to pigeonhole people by their past work, and getting casting agents, directors and others to think of her as an actress takes lots of work.

"It's the most challenging thing I have to do," she says. "People just want to see things one way. When I go to these auditions, I feel like I have to prove myself 10 times over."

She loves hosting, of course, and it's almost second nature to her these days.

But "acting is a challenge," she says. "I have to break all these barriers. When you win a role, like the Steve Harvey role, it's so satisfying. I teared up, and that's not usually me."

Anthony is also preparing for the launch of her reality series, "La La's Full Court Life," on Monday at 9 p.m. on VH1. Her previous series dealt with her marriage to Anthony; this one tags along as she adjusts to a different spotlight when her husband is traded from Denver to the Knicks. The cameras are also there as she juggles career, friends and family.

"I feel good about the show," she says. "I wanted it to be a fun show. I didn't want anything I wouldn't be proud of."

She's also an executive on the series, so she's more hands-on than most stars in her situation. She and her husband run Kross-over Entertainment, which produces the series, and they've got a slate of other projects.

‘I see myself stepping more heavily into the producing world," she says. "I like having that control, and being in control so to speak, and being part of picking great material and bringing it to life."

There's something about finding a good script, envisioning the project and then getting it made, she says, that intrigues her.

"Melo has his hands on a couple of projects," she says. "We're working with Brett Ratner — we have this project we want to get off the ground about a basketball player who fell from grace. We're looking for pieces that are inspiring to us. We want stuff that speaks to us and what we like."

There's also a children's book about bullying they'd like to do.

Melo is doing all this, it should be noted, while training for the upcoming basketball season, although the NBA is in a lockout situation, which puts everything on hold until a contract between the players and the league can be settled.

"People don't understand how hard this guy works out" — three times a day, she says. "He's going from a boxing workout to weight training to a regular workout. He's proceeding [on the assumption] that there will be a basketball season."

During hoops season, the couple lives in New York. In the off-season, they shift to Los Angeles, where they work on the entertainment stuff.

How does she balance all of this?

"I just enjoy it," she says. "There's something great about life when you can do something you enjoy. Not everybody can. They're miserable, or not happy. I enjoy making people laugh and making them smile."

That, as well as dealing with serious issues, is a goal of the reality show, she says.

In her case, the issues are balancing the various parts of her career. For instance, hours after talking to The News, she's heading for New York, where she'll do a photo shoot before heading back to L.A.

"I'm not in one place for a long enough," she says. "There is something cool about being still. ... But when you love what you do, you push through. I could have bigger problems."


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