By Karu F. Daniels, AOL Black Voices

"I just read your story on Miss New York and I thought that was wonderful," Roz Ryan told me when I finally caught up to her, after a packed set last night at New York's City's Triad Theater.

"She's insane," she continued. "I love crazy people because crazy people are just crazy. They don't try to front and try to perpetuate. I mean, I'm crazy. And I have my best moments on stage when I have the mike in my hand and I'm in charge so I could just be crazy."

Ain't that about a bitch?

Literally.

A seasoned Broadway and television performer talking up Miss New York.

Something else, I tell ya.

To many television viewers, Ryan is one of those unforgettable forces of nature who really knows how to pack a punch. As Sister Amelia Heterbrink, her and acclaimed theater veteran Barbara Montgomery, camped it up as meddling churchgoing siblings on the Sherman Hemsley-fronted 'Amen' in the 1980s.

Through the years, she appeared in a gang of other black-centric TV series, including 'Good News,' 'Sparks,' 'Half & Half,' 'Barbershop' and 'All About the Andersons' (currently appearing on the TV One network, alongside 'Amen.')

"When I run into some of the people on the train and in the streets right now, they think we're doing it now," she said of the shows' resurgence on the fast rising digital cable channel. "And I'm like 'I don't do that no mo'," she quipped.

The 55-year old Detroit native most recently has appeared as Matron Mama Morton in Broadway's long running, Tony Award winning musical revival 'Chicago.' Today, she was extended in the zesty role that is thrilling current day theatergoers eight times a week.

It's a full circle triumph for her. It was on The Great White Way where she made her mark as Effie Melody White in the original Broadway production of Michael Bennett's 'Dreamgirls' -- once the show's original star Jennifer Holliday left the show to pursue a recording career.

When asked what did she bring to the role that was different from many others over the years, Ryan (who performed through the remainder of the historical run) became solemn and replied, "blood."

"I say that because that's what she drained every night," she further elaborated. "It sounds really strange because they're likening it to Jennifer Hudson's lifestyle but it was really my life. It was my life coming up in Detroit being the little fat girl with the big voice and not looking like what they thought a recording artist and successful people would look like but having the sound and being told several times that I didn't have the proper look. Or because of the strength of my voice, they didn't know how to market me . It was the same kind of rejection. And when I came and saw Dreamgirls, I said 'damn, they done been all with me all my life. It was my life.'"

Whoa.

Ryan said that because the 'Dreamgirls' repertoire left such an indelible impact on her being, she refuses to sing the signature tune "And I Am Telling You I'm Not Going."

"That song hurts too bad," she revealed. "It hurts bad. And I don't really like it out of context. I don't like it without the preceding scene. I don't like it. It just doesn't have the same stuff without that scene.

"I've done it a few times," she reflected. "I did it for this guy when I was doing industrials --and he loved this song-- but I did it for him because they paid some "I'm Not Going" money. But I haven't done it in years."

"That song hurts," she continued. "It hurt Jennifer Holliday. It hurt Jennifer Hudson. It's painful. I cried when I heard her sing that song. I was in the movie theater crying because it brought back all of this stuff and she sang the natural fool out of it."

You gotta love those Detroit natives for the mere fact that they can let terms like "natural fool out of it" roll off their tongues. Love that.

During her star turn at The Triad last night, Ryan performed with her longtime collaborator Shelton Beckton for the venue's much lauded "Just A Piano" series. "I have so much fun doing that," she said. "I do that for me and Shelton now because (pause) baby the recording industry did me in, and the nightclub did me in so I come to Broadway, make money and do that for fun."

The two-hour plus cabaret set infuses original compositions with stand out jazz classics. One in particular was her hearty rendition of "My Way," a song staple popularized by stylists such as Frank Sinatra and Nina Simone over the years. The vocal powerhouse brings such a rich dexterity to the standard tune -- it's like none other. It's a new favorite of mine.

"You know where that comes from, right?" she asked, then answered, "[late jazz great] Art Blakey."

"It became my version through him," she added. "When I was in Detroit I would work with all of the jazz musicians that would play for singers and he suggested that I do 'My Way' and I've been doing it forever.

"Oh my God, it's been 20, 30 years," she pondered. "... Shut up now!"

BV Extras:

-- See "Dreamgirls: Then & Now." It's Must See BV!!!