Last summer, a little show called DROP DEAD DIVA, about a beautiful but vapid model who gets killed and is awakened in the body of a beautiful-on-the-inside-and-out lawyer with little to no idea what shoes go with which purse, premiered on Lifetime.  When I talked to the star, Brooke Elliott, before the premiere, I don’t think either of us knew what a huge hit it would turn out to be!

Season 2 begins on Sunday, June 6, at 9PM on Lifetime, and I’m so excited to see what happens next!  I had the chance to talk to Brooke again this year, and she’s as excited as we are!   Read on for where we left our favorite characters, and what’s coming up as the season begins (some mild spoilers so read at your own risk)!

Here we are, getting ready for Season 2.  I love the show!  Every time I watch, I love it a little bit more.
[laughs] Oh that’s great, that’s awesome!

So for starters, tell people who didn’t watch or who don’t remember, where we left Jane, what was happening, and now, where we start the season.
We left Jane in some huge kind of stuggles.  She was in a career struggle, she’s facing disbarment, because of an ethical position on a case that she was on.  She’s also in a bit of a love confusion.  She’s dating someone, but she of course has feelings for Grayson, always, and of course we found out at the end of last season that she has a husband that she didn’t know anything about.  So we’ve got her kind of struggling in the love world, and she’s struggling in the career world, and she’s trying to figure out how to be this new person that she is.  So we end season 1 with that, and we actually begin season 2, I think it’s 12 hours later.  It picks right up, and she’s thrown into kind of trying to figure all of this stuff out, and that’s where we find her when we open season 2!

How do you think Jane/Deb have changed since we first met her/them?
I think she’s got tons of more compassion.  She’s seen how maybe she treated people in the past, and having that to her, has given her a sense of who does she want to be.  What kind of person does she want to be?  I mean, she’s not completely developed yet, she still falls into her Deb ways, but you know, I think she’s developed some compassion.  I think she has developed a bigger heart than she knew she had before.  I think she’s realized the joy that you can have by helping people, honestly, and legitimately, and selflessly and I don’t think she ever had that before.

It’s such a nice character – people are always changing as they grow, so to have this character that they’re identifying with, who is learning a whole new world.
Yeah, absolutely!

What has been the reaction from fans?
You know, I do get some people stopping me and saying how much they love the show or how much they appreciate my work, which is so nice to hear.  People seem to be on board and so excited for Season 2, which is so nice to hear!

You get to sing a little bit in the premiere.  Are we going to see more of that as the show goes?
I sing in the premiere, and I think I also sing with Faith Prince.  She comes back, she’s Jane’s mom, and we sing a little bit, I think it’s in the 5th episode or so, and I think I’ll probably sing again more towards the finale.

How far into shooting season 2 are you?
We are shooting episode 208 right now.

What other things can you tease for us that we can look forward to over the summer?
She will have more of a relationship with Tony, who we saw last season, so that will be kind of fun to see what happens between the two of them, and I don’t want to give anything away!  She will have some dream sequences, which are really fun, and we have a little Thunder from Down Under, who was a guest star on the show [laughs] so that’s fun stuff.  So gets to kind of walk that soul mate line with Grayson.  Do they really have a chance with her in this new body, or in this new life, or do they not?

I think that the friendships with Stacy and Teri – I love seeing them play back and forth.  Stacy’s the friend from Deb days, and Teri was always Jane’s friend.  Will we get to see more of the three of you together?
Oh gosh!  I don’t know if we have a lot of Teri and Stacy and Jane!  There’s some of it, for sure.  We haven’t gone out like we did last season, when all three of us went out!

I don’t think it’s a spoiler to say that Fred is back, and if it is, spoiler alert!  I think people were worried that he was gone for good.  How is he involved this season?
Well, in 201 (Sunday’s episode), we talk about where he’s been, and what his role is now.  Jane’s in quite a predicament in love and career that Fred had to be sent back to help her out [laughs] to gain control of what’s going on down here.

I love that the show has these great guest stars that are there to serve the story, not the other way around.  What can you tell us about who we’ll see this season?
We have great people again this year!  Rosie O’Donnell comes back, and Faith Prince who’s Jane’s mom, comes back, and Sharon Lawrence, who’s Deb’s mom comes back.  We also have Robin Givens, Cybill Shepherd, Kurt Fuller.  Leelee Sobieski.  Gosh, who else?  We’ve had so many wonderful people come.  I’m sure I’m forgetting people.  Yeah, so we have great people. And even our guest stars that aren’t huge names have been hugely talented!

Why do you think people haven’t watched should get involved, or why should people keep watching for Season 2?
I think one of the reason the show is so great and I think people who caught it last season and people who can catch it now – it’s such a show that you can relate to.  The subject matter of finding out who you are, and growing up and figuring out the person you were.  Is that the person you want to be now?  Ours is an extreme situation, with Deb is now in Jane’s body, but the points that were made, and I think that’s what people are finding.  They’re finding that they also are struggling in their lives to figure out what they want, and who they want to be, and who are they, and growing up against what society tells them they should be or not be and I think it’s just a universal thing that people go through.

Is there one episode from the first season [now that the DVD is out], that people should go back and watch, if they haven’t seen it?
I would definitely watch the finale.  I’m really proud of the finale; I think it was a great episode.  Maybe the pilot, just so they’re caught up.  There’s something good in every single episode.  When you asked that question it was like, oh, go to this part in this episode, and this part in that episode.  There are so many great things to fill you in and get you excited about it, but each episode kind of has a little bit of that!

So long story short, watch the whole season!
[laughs] Yeah, there you go! [laughs]

What else did you in your downtime besides DROP DEAD DIVA?
This last time on hiatus, I did not do a job, actually.  I took some vacation time.  I went and did some vacation time alone, and then did vacation time with my family, and I tried to get situated in LA because I was from New York, so I had to get that going.  I did some business arrangement type things with my team.

Last question here – what are you watching on TV these days?
I love MODERN FAMILY.  I love GREY’S ANATOMY, 30 ROCK, THE OFFICE.  I have admitted, and will continue to admit that I do like THE BACHELOR and THE BACHELORETTE.  There’s so much that I hear about that I want to watch though.  I hear about WHITE COLLAR, and FLASH FORWARD and all these shows that I have no time to watch right now, but maybe in my hiatus!