It’s over two years since we found out that a Whitney Houston biopic was in the works, and now the first official trailer is here.
Titled I Wanna Dance With Somebody, the biographical drama sees Naomi Ackie (The End of the F***ing World, Master of None) bravely take on the starring role as Whitney. The impressive cast also contains Ashton Sanders (Moonlight) as Bobby Brown and Stanley Tucci as Clive Davis.
The biopic is described as a “no-holds barred portrait of the complex and multifaceted woman behind The Voice.” The film follows Whitney’s journey from New Jersey choir girl to one of the best-selling and most beloved singers of all time.
“My dream? Sing what I want to sing, be how I want to be,” Ackie’s Houston can be heard saying in the trailer. “Reach as big an audience as I can.”
Elsewhere in the first trailer, Whitney is told that her music “isn’t Black enough.” “Look, I don’t know how to sing Black, and I don’t know how to sing white either. I know how to sing,” she boldly responds. How right she was.
I Wanna Dance With Somebody is being written by Anthony McCarten, who has a lot of history with biopics, previously penning The Theory of Everything, Darkest Hour, and Bohemian Rhapsody. It’s being directed by Kasi Lemmons, who earned acclaim for helming the 2019 biopic Harriet.
You can check out the full trailer below. I Wanna Dance With Somebody is scheduled for release in cinemas on December 21st.
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In other Whitney Houston news, a remake of The Bodyguard is currently in the works. The singer starred alongside Kevin Costner in the iconic original, one of the defining films of the 1990s.
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Check out the trailer for I Wanna Dance With Somebody:
