Actor Chris Tucker was among the famous faces when Oprah Winfrey opened her first school for disadvantaged girls in South Africa earlier this year. Honoring a request from the talk-show queen, he brought a personally inscribed book for the library.

His choice? "The Purpose-Driven Life" by Rick Warren, the world's most influential Protestant pastor and a best-selling author whose book is designed to take readers on a 40-day journey to discover their life's mission.

"It's a faith-driven book I thought would encourage the kids if they read it. You read it in 41, 42 days, it's just encouraging words. Really great," he said over the phone during a publicity stop in Philadelphia.

Tucker's mission is twofold, at least: to make people laugh and, like Winfrey and others, to help children in Africa.

On Friday, it will be all about the first, as "Rush Hour 3" pairs Tucker, 34, and Jackie Chan, 53, for another action comedy directed by Brett Ratner. Tucker has a simple goal for the movie: "Make people laugh and forget their problems for a little bit and just go on a little journey."

"Rush Hour 3" takes place six years after the leading characters boarded a plane bound for New York at the end of "Rush Hour 2." That movie opened in August 2001 with $66.8 million, a comedy record at the time, and made nearly $329 million worldwide.

When it came time for a third go-round, Tucker says he was looking for something fresh and different, particularly when it came to the location.

"We had to decide where we would go this time and we decided we'd go to Paris, which makes it fresh and we both now are fish out of water. The script was a big part of my concern; I didn't want it to be too slapstick, I wanted it to be fun and interesting."

The mismatched partners travel to France to battle a wing of the Chinese organized crime family, the Triads. They star alongside Max von Sydow as head of the World Criminal Court, Roman Polanski as a French detective and Hiroyuki Sanada (part of the space mission in "Sunshine") as a Triad assassin.

As the story opens, Tucker's Detective Carter is still with the LAPD but he's now working the streets as a traffic officer.

"You see this guy in a police uniform directing traffic and think, 'What did this guy do to get himself in trouble?' But he's not worried about it," Ratner says. "He's just dancing and singing to his favorite song in the headphones," as a traffic accident swirls around him.

A meeting of the World Criminal Court about the wide-reaching Chinese crime ring is happening nearby, and Carter is comedically drawn into the action.

Much has been made about Tucker's reported salary of $25 million, up dramatically from the $2 million he got for the first "Rush Hour" and $20 million for the second. The comedian agrees it's a little weird and potentially distracting for audiences to know the heft of his paycheck.

"It is, it is. I don't want people to think that the only way I'll make a movie is if they pay me a certain amount of money because that's not how I choose to make movies. I always look at the idea and the situation but never the money," he said.

"I think the money is always secondary," although it is the measuring stick for Hollywood, which has put Tucker in the same class as Eddie Murphy and Jim Carrey. In fact, it was seeing Murphy in "48 Hours" and the late Richard Pryor in "Stir Crazy" that inspired him to be a stand-up comedian and actor.

"My true reward is people saying it's a great movie, we really had a good time. ... I don't want people thinking about that when they're watching me in the movie."

He's not afraid to slip into the theater on opening weekend, or admit he does, in that trademark voice that sounds like he's had a little hit of helium. "I want to see the reaction, I want to see the crowds come in, if it's crowded, if it's sold out. I love that type of stuff. I love to go watch my own movies."

He hasn't been able to do that for six years, since the second "Rush Hour." No one will ever bust Tucker for being another Jude Law, so ubiquitous that onetime Oscar host Chris Rock joked about it.

"I'm not advocating six-year screen absences, but there is a reason De Beers doesn't flood the market with diamonds, and Chris hasn't hurt himself by leaving his audience wanting more," New Line president Toby Emmerich told Playboy magazine as part of its August interview with Tucker.

As for what the "Rush Hour" franchise has meant for his career, Tucker says, "I think it gave me international appeal, from Jackie Chan being known all over the world. This movie traveled to a lot of places and it gave me the opportunity to also just be known around the world and travel around the world."

The Atlanta native has been busy with, among other things, his Chris Tucker Foundation and trips to Africa, often with heads of state or rock royalty. He was struck by how beautiful it is and how the people had "a lot of love in their hearts," despite poverty and other trials and tribulations.

"It's a big problem with orphans in Africa because a lot of the parents have been killed in wars or died of diseases," including water-borne diseases. "I think what I want to do is concentrate on the kids and maybe try to help and build more schools over there and more hospitals like Dikembe Mutombo [of the NBA Houston Rockets] and Oprah's doing with her school.

"And, also, just bringing more attention to different places in the world that have a lot of challenges, to give the kids more opportunity to go to school ... or do whatever they want to do."

Just like Tucker.