Watch the first trailer for Whitney Houston biopic ‘I Wanna Dance With Somebody’
Two years ago, it was announced that the estate of Whitney Houston had signed off on a new biopic centred on the later singer. With record label executive Clive Davis producing, the film quickly signed on British actress Naomi Ackie to portray Houston. That’s all we heard for a while, but now we’re getting our first glimpse of the film in the form of a new trailer.
The trailer features Stanley Tucci as Davis, witnessing a young Houston perform at a nightclub and discovering a star. The whole trailer gives off pretty standard biopic vibes, the same ones that Baz Luhrmann’s Elvis couldn’t shake. At least Elvis had a sense of electricity to it, though. The same can’t be said for the extremely by-the-numbers first look at I Wanna Dance With Somebody.
Houston was 21 when her self-titled debut came out, and Ackie simply looks too old to portray such a young person. Also, Houston performs ‘I Wanna Dance With Somebody’ in a jazz club for some reason, a solid four years before it would appear on her second LP, Whitney. The whole trailer plays fast and loose with Houston’s life and timeline, which isn’t exactly a great sign for the film.
It would be different, though, if the trailer made it seems as though the film was taking us through a side of Houston that we haven’t seen before. That’s absolutely not the case. There’s literally a scene where a radio DJ tells her point blank, “A common criticism of you: your music isn’t black enough.” The idea of “show don’t tell” isn’t exactly conducive to a teaser trailer, but obviously, there have been no lessons learned in the decade since Walk Hard made these kinds of biopics passé.
Maybe I Wanna Dance With Somebody will transcend the incredibly basic tropes that the trailer has highlighted. Probably not, but hey, there’s a chance. Until then, we’ll just have to cover our ears and try to act like this wretched-looking biopic doesn’t actually exist.
Check out the first trailer for I Wanna Dance With Somebody down below. The film is set to premiere on December 21st.
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