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Four favorite faces return to prime-time TV | 17619__lucy_l
TARZAN LOVES LUCY Lawless re-enters the TV jungle as the ape-man's aunt on ''Tarzan''
Lucy Lawless Photograph by Gregg Segal

She's best known for playing a ball-busting warrior who -- if you believed the scuttlebutt -- engaged in hot girl-on-girl action when she wasn't busy laying the smack down with a flick of her chakram. You really didn't want to get on her bad side, which is why it's so...ODD to hear Lucy Lawless describe a peaceful life since ''Xena: Warrior Princess'' ended its six-year run in 2001. ''I've been doing mom stuff like growing a baby!'' says the 35-year-old New Zealand native, who gave birth to a third child, son Jude, last year. ''Getting healthy! Catching up with friends! Visiting my husband's family in Michigan!''

But everyone knows you can't keep a good mercenary down -- and that's why Lawless, who admits to ''some nervous moments where I thought I'd never work again,'' agreed to channel those maternal instincts for her role as newspaper magnate Kathleen Clayton on The WB's ''Tarzan.'' She plays auntie to hunk Travis Fimmel's ape-man. ''It's stylish and gnarly, and targeted to a demo that's not so bad for career longevity,'' she says, clearly aware of TV's economic realities. ''I hate to be calculating, but I want to broaden my audience.''

And to think she didn't accept the producers' original offer. Uninterested in signing a multiyear contract, Lawless declined the role only to return -- at the producers' behest -- after they nixed American actress Jenna Stern in late August. (The situation strangely parallels her ''Xena'' breakout: Lawless took the part after the original lead fell sick as shooting began. Asked about the coincidence, Lawless replies with characteristic flippancy: ''Eh, I'm building a career on the dregs of other actresses!'') She agreed to sign on for the first season of ''Tarzan'' and struck a development deal with The WB that could lead to her own show next year.

Though not engaging in the sort of butt kicking for which Xena was famed, Lawless admits she's trying to spice up her story. ''I suggested [Kathleen] get infected with crazy monkey blood.'' (If only!) ''And that went down like a cup of cold coffee,'' she says. ''Then I said, 'Tarzan and I could wrestle on the floor, and it could turn sexual. You know: Tarzan does his aunt.''' (Um, honey, this isn't the Spice Channel.) ''They weren't jumping on that bandwagon, either.''

But Lawless insists she doesn't need to be manhandling bad (or good) guys to enjoy a role. ''I'm terribly happy mincing about in high heels. Nobody's saying, 'Lucy! Go lie in that puddle of blood!' It's 'Lucy! Sit in the limo and stay warm while the other actors sit under the rain machine!' I just sit there and go TEE-HEE-HEE!'' -- Nicholas Fonseca


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