Joely Fisher’s Feeling Heavenly : Movies: The actress-singer daughter of Connie Stevens and Eddie Fisher lands her first film role in James L. Brooks’ ‘I’ll Do Anything.’

The angels are definitely watching over Joely Fisher these days. Well, at least they are in her rose-colored West Los Angeles living room, which is adorned with every kind of angel imaginable.

“I like the idea you can have angels,” said Fisher, the 26-year-old singer-actress daughter of Connie Stevens and Eddie Fisher and half-sister of actress-author Carrie Fisher. “I think they are beautiful. I believe in a lot of crazy metaphysical stuff. But I also feel protected in a way . . . even if it’s a state of mind. I think a lot of things are.”

Including feeling good about herself. “When you feel good about things on the inside, you start looking better on the outside and things start happening for you,” Fisher said.

Things have been happening for Fisher in recent years, starting with the loss of 30 pounds. “It’s made a difference in the business,” she admitted. “Everybody always said, ‘You aren’t heavy.’ But I’m a big girl. Everybody thought I had that kind of Raphael body.”

She also dyed her long, wildly curly blond hair auburn for her first film role in James L. Brooks’ upcoming movie “I’ll Do Anything.” She loved the look so much that she’s kept it (“It’s very down to earth”).

Fisher spent five months working on “I’ll Do Anything,” in which she plays an ambitious movie development executive--”one of the ones who will make it and be a head of the studio someday,” she said. The film--initially planned for a Christmas release--stars Nick Nolte and Julie Kavner and was shot as a lavish musical. But it’s now being reworked into a non-musical by Brooks after it performed poorly in test screenings.

“I guess everyone is a little disappointed,” said Fisher, who performed in some of the ensemble musical numbers. “But I think the movie works. The music did forward the plot, so we are doing re-shoots on a couple of scenes. I look forward to re-shooting with (Brooks) because it was such a great experience. But I think back to the days on end we shot this tap number with 300 tappers out in Agoura and I get a little lump in my throat because no one will see that.”

Singing has always been an integral part of Fisher’s life. “My instrument is like the power of my dad and then, hopefully, the soft lullaby in your ear that my mother could always do,” Fisher said.

By age 12, young Joely was joining her mother on stage to perform numbers. As a teen-ager, she acted in summer stock and did guest shots on TV series. “It’s kind of like as a child, (Fisher and younger sister Tricia) would say, ‘Am I going to sing in Las Vegas? Am I going to be on Broadway?’ Show business was in our blood.”

Since completing “I’ll Do Anything,” Fisher did a small part in a horror comedy titled “The Mask” and just began filming a USA cable movie, “The Companion.” And she was able to exercise her well-pedigreed vocal chords playing an incest victim in a workshop production of a new musical, “SCREAM,” by Arthur Janov and David Foster, at the Primal Center in Venice.

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“It’s about primal therapy,” Fisher said. “I went from singing David Foster melodies in a beautifully demanding singing role into (‘SCREAM’), where I had to physically go through a primal experience, which is something that’s very emotional.”

And according to Grammy-winning composer-producer Foster (“Dreamgirls,” “The Bodyguard”), Fisher has the talent beyond her good genes. “I think she has great instincts,” he said. “I already loved her voice and wasn’t really aware of her acting, but she came in to audition for ‘SCREAM’ and just blew everybody away. She performed brilliantly for seven nights in a row. We all fell in love with her.”

Fisher also has cut a Christmas album with her mother and sister Tricia, “Tradition--A Family Christmas,” which is being sold on the Home Shopping Network. Her mother’s cosmetics line is one of the network’s top-sellers.

A fan of ballads, Fisher hopes to record a solo album soon. “I have five songs picked out and I am holding on to them,” she said. “I put (the album) on hold to do the film. I believe that’s something I am meant to do.”

Fisher’s parents divorced when she was 2. Her father, who battled alcohol and drugs for years, wasn’t around while she or Tricia were growing up. “But he started to be my dad a number of years ago,” she said. “He’s, like, there for us now.”

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She and her sister still live at their mother’s spacious home in West Los Angeles, although they now have their own apartments near the pool. Although Fisher aspires to “great work,” she learned from her mother years ago that show business isn’t everything. “It’s surrounding yourself with family and friends,” Fisher said, “having children and seeing them grow. Of course, having nice things is wonderful. (My mother) has always given us beautiful things and surrounded us with lots of loving people.”

Sunday, Fisher and her mother and sister will appear in the annual Hollywood Christmas Parade. “We’ve done it over the years, but it was like as ‘Connie’s kids.’ Brandon Lee was a friend of mine, and he said, ‘It’s really funny. We always had a comma after our name.’ They would say, ‘Joely Fisher,’ and then they would have a comma and say, ‘daughter of Eddie Fisher and Connie Stevens.’

“I’m proud of who my parents are, but you always want to be able to prove that what you are doing is not because of who your gene pool is,” Fisher said. “My father said I am coming into my own now. That’s a good feeling. I’m making the comma a little smaller.”