Jul 03, 2009  |  By: Joey DiGuglielmo  | COMMENTS     

It’s 7:45 a.m. on a run-of-the-mill Tuesday in Washington and radio talk diva Wendy Williams looks like she’s ready to take the stage at Ziegfeld’s around midnight for a drag performance. With a nearly waist-length Mariah-esque wig, false eyelashes, leopard print top and gargantuan rings on each hand — one a topaz, the other a diamond that should be in the Smithsonian if it’s real — she looks ready for her closeup.

The only nod to subtlety is the relatively subdued shade of her lilac lipstick. Sitting in a bland backstage room at the WTTG Fox studios in Friendship Heights, she looks down at her silver glitter-encrusted ballet slippers and says, “Oh, I forgot to slip into my heels when you came. I’m still wearing my flats.” No worries, though. They match the half-dozen heavy silver bangles that clang from her right arm as she gesticulates.

And Wendy Williams gesticulates a lot. If the outfit seems outrageous for the time of day — she takes drag queen comparisons as compliments — it’s only because she’s ready for her next part. She’s made a career in radio with “The Wendy Williams Experience,” a Big Apple staple on WBLS 107.5 FM, and other shows, but she’s transitioning now to TV. After a successful test run in four markets last summer, the nationally syndicated “Wendy Williams Show” will debut July 13 in 95 percent of the country. The local Fox station, WTTG, has her hour-long show slated for the 10 a.m. weekday slot.

Williams says she’s excited, but unfazed by the prospect of facing the cameras.

“For me, with TV, the only difference is time constraint and hair and makeup. I’m very comfortable, finally, with how I look.”

That she couldn’t be seen on radio had little impact on her over-the-top fashion sense.

“I always dressed for radio,” she says, laughing at the suggestion that she wore only sweats or a housedress to the studio. “I don’t wear lashes for radio, but I would wear a 5-inch heel and, on a day like this, sexy cutoffs — not Daisy Dukes, because I am of a particular age — and a T-shirt, always one size too small. And the hair, well I’m on TV now, but it would be bigger for radio. That and big sunglasses and I’m on my way. I’ve always had flair. For me, mediocrity is the death of my entire situation. Beige walls just screw up everything in my plans.”

Williams says her show will feature a “View”-like “hot topics” segment for the first third, celebrity guests for the middle and a “Loveline”-esque advice segment for its final third. She admits she’s not radically reinventing the daytime talk wheel, but calls her vision a “remix of an idea.”

“The idea for me, is that daytime talk is to entertain the masses,” the 45-year-old says. “Daytime is not supposed to be there for a political agenda, it’s not supposed to be there to inundate you with stuff — it’s supposed to be there to entertain you, a la Mike Douglas, Ellen, Tyra, Oprah.”

Williams is a Jersey girl. She’ll commute into New York to tape, as she’s done for radio most of her career. She’s straight and has a young son named after her husband, Kevin, who’s executive producing the show along with Rob Dauber, a gay daytime TV vet who’s worked with Rosie O’Donnell, Martha Stewart and Oprah Winfrey.

“We’re just doing our best to let Wendy be Wendy,” Dauber says of their vision for the show. He thinks she has the talent to achieve a similar level of success. He also appreciates the open work environment she affords.

“It’s great to work with a host who’s so accepting,” he says. “It’s just not an issue, not even a thought. I look at some of my [gay] friends in local news markets and I realize how lucky I am.”

Williams says she’s had a gay following for practically her entire career. She just won a NewNowNext Award from Logo, a gay cable channel, where her radio show was dubbed “Most Guiltiest Pleasure.” And though she’s aiming for mass appeal, she says gays and lesbians are part her vision.

“I’m just as comfortable talking to Carson Kressley as Kim Kardashian,” she says.