MARINA (known as Marina Kamen when not in her entertainer role) always wanted to be a performer. There were just two problems. She weighed 200 pounds, and, having chosen marriage and family, she had put her career on hold. But in her mid-30s, she told her husband. “I have to pursue my dream.” MARINA, who had worked as an aerobics instructor in her early 20s, wanted to record a dance-music tape (she’d sing and play keyboards) that could be sold to aerobics classes. Her husband didn’t take the news well. At the time, the couple was running their own TV/radio advertising production studio and business was soaring. “When you’re comfortable financially, you can talk yourself out of things,” says MARINA, whose Kamen Entertainment/MRK Records grosses over $2 million a year. “Some fighting, lots of therapy, and constant communication,” she says, changed her husband’s mind. But, at 200 pounds, who would believe that she knew anything about getting fit? So MARINA got movin’ and dropped 100 pounds. MARINA’s first CD, Um Lotty Da, which came out in 1999, features her original songs, while her newest, Under Her Covers, is a compilation of classic pop remakes. Clubs, aerobic fitness centers and Jazzercise classes play her music, which is sold at Tower Records and Virgin Records and on on her website (www.mrkrecords.com). MARINA performs at corporate and sports events across the country. “I’m really an entertainer and a motivator,” says MARINA. “The first thing I do when I get out on stage is say, “I’m 41, I have three kids and I’ve lost 100 pounds.’”