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The following story contains spoilers from the movie “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom,” now streaming on Netflix.
The final frames of
Netflix’s “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom,” adapted from two-time Pulitzer Prize winner August Wilson’s 1982 play, show a dozen or so white men performing in a recording studio. The instrumentalists appear dull and unfeeling; the singer’s delivery is dry. The trumpet solo, meant to be the song’s standout riff, feels particularly hollow, void of charisma. Yet above them the producer nods, pleased with what he hears.
The scene, which is only a minute long, isn’t in the original play. But witnessing this bland rendition of the vibrant song that Levee, Chadwick Boseman’s talented trumpeter, has been practically coerced to give away punctuates the heartbreaking saga of
“Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom” was August Wilson’s first play to hit Broadway. Now it’s his second to become a feature film. The Pittsburgh-born playwright’s namesake August Wilson Center for African American Culture marks the occasion with a virtual panel discussion featuring some of the new film’s distinguished creative team. Ma Rainey Redux Part II virtual panel discussion: 7 p.m. Fri., Dec. 18
The panel on Fri., Dec. 18 – the same day the film premieres on Netflix – includes director and Broadway veteran George C. Wolfe; the film’s screenwriter, the actor and Wilson collaborator Ruben Santiago-Hudson; and Constanza Romero, Wilson’s widow and the film’s executive producer. Moderator Jessica Lanay, the Center’s literary curator, says Wilson’s drama illuminates the little-known roots of American popular culture.
Jake Coyle
FILE - Playwright August Wilson poses at Yale University in New Haven, Conn. on April 7, 2005. A film adaptation of August Wilsonâs play âMa Raineyâs Black Bottom,â premieres on Netflix this Friday. (AP Photo/ Michelle McLoughlin, File) December 16, 2020 - 6:00 PM
NEW YORK - Like many of those involved in the making of âMa Raineyâs Black Bottom,â itâs not easy for Viola Davis to summarize what playwright August Wilson has meant to her except to answer, âEverything.â
Davis first stage role was in Wilsonâs âJoe Turnerâs Come and Gone.â She made her Broadway debut in his âSeven Guitarsâ and won a Tony for âKing Hedley II.â After playing Rose on Broadway in Wilsonâs âFences,â she reprised the role in Denzel Washingtonâs 2016 film, winning her an Oscar. Most of all, as a drama student, a new light turned on for Davis when she first enco