Crushing on Kryptonite

Though many know her as a host of Extra, the syndicated newsmagazine, Tracey Edmonds has been active behind the camera for the past 20 years.

She’s executive-produced such projects as Showtime’s Soul Food: The Series, BET’s College Hill, two hit reality series starring rappers Lil’ Kim and DMX, and the recent Lifetime telefilm With This Ring.

“Those who know me really well,” she says, “know that being in front of the camera was actually my kryptonite.”

But last year Edmonds had to overcome her fear when she agreed to costar with her beau, sports icon Deion Sanders, in the OWN series Deion’s Family Playbook.

The reality series, which she also executive-produces with Sanders, ranks as the highest-rated freshman non-scripted series in OWN’s history. The second season began in May.

Neither appearing on camera — nor falling in love — was part of her plan when she met with Sanders to discuss show ideas. But romance ensued, and once network executives got wind of it, they pleaded with Edmonds to play a part in the show.

“I thought long and hard about whether I was ready to put myself out to America in a relationship,” she says. But then she considered the producer’s point of view.

“To capture all the things that were going on in Deion’s life, we decided to include my relationship as part of the layers.”

As the ex-wife of music producer Kenneth “Babyface” Edmonds and the former fiancée of actor-comedian Eddie Murphy, Edmonds may seem to many like a Hollywood insider. But remembering her days growing up in Carson, California, she doesn’t see herself that way.

And she’s worked hard to build a producing career.

“A lot of time, Hollywood wants to pigeonhole African-American producers,” she says. “I knew that if I was going to have a career in this business, I was going to have to go after the stories I wanted to tell and develop my own shows.

"I knew I had to make myself different from the type of African-American producer that Hollywood would normally expect.”