I’ll say this for Lifetime: The cable network may draw little in the way of “prestige” attention, but it’s at least making mainstream, widely available movies about women of color like Aaliyah: The Princess of R&B, An En Vogue Christmas (airing Dec. 11), and January’s Whitney that the film industry at large isn’t producing.
And the prestige may not be too far off. Angela Bassett’s directorial debut, starring Yaya DaCosta as Whitney Houston, looks like a cut above the average TV movie. Whitney finds Houston torn between the demands of her superstar career and the needs of her husband Bobby Brown. It’ll be interesting to see how Bassett interprets Houston and Brown’s famously tempestuous marriage.
Singer Deborah Cox will perform some of Houston’s greatest hits, including “The Greatest Love of All,” “I’m Your Baby Tonight,” “I’m Every Woman” and “I Will Always Love You.”
Whitney hits the screen on January 17.
