M ARTIN L UTHER K ING J R .
January 14, 2015
Page 29
2015 special edition
Arts &
Entertainment
Queen Latifah speaks about her role as the
legendary blues singer Bessie Smith in the
HBO Films drama, "Bessie," debuting
sometime this spring. (AP photo)
Schooled for Film Role
Queen Latifah
to portray
legendary singer
(AP) - When Queen Latifah
was approached 20 years ago
to play Bessie Smith, she had
to do some research.
"I was Queen Latifah the rap-
per. I had no idea who Bessie
Smith was," the singer-actress
told the Television Critics As-
sociation on Thursday.
Since then, she's been thor-
oughly schooled in the life and
talent of the legendary blues
singer, whom Latifah, 44, fi-
nally gets to portray in the
HBO film "Bessie."
Her music "may be almost
100 years old, but it has a
power a lot of artists could
learn from today," Latifah said.
Smith herself would be a suc-
cess if she were a contempo-
rary artist, Latifah said of the
singer who died in 1937 at age
43.
"Bessie," whose cast in-
cludes Mo'Nique, Michael
Kenneth Williams, Khandi
Alexander, Mike Epps and
Charles S. Dutton, will air this
spring. A date was not an-
nounced.
The film was directed and
co-written by Dee Rees and
includes among its producers
Lili Fini Zanuck and Richard
D. Zanuck, who first brought
the idea of a Smith film to
Latifah. Richard Zanuck died
in 2012.
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