The Hollywood Reporter announced today that Netflix is working on a screen adaptation of August Wilson‘s Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom that will star Viola Davis as the 1920s blues singer. Also in the cast: Black Panther‘s Chadwick Boseman, Emmy winner Glynn Turman, Tony and Olivier nominee Colman Domingo and Michael Potts. Denzel Washington will produce.
The story follows Ma Rainey, a famed blues singer, as she makes a record in a studio in 1920s Chicago, where tensions boil over between her, her white agent and producer and the bandmates
The play’s title refers to a song of the same title by Ma Rainey referring to the Black Bottom dance.
The last time Ma Rainey played on Broadway was in 2003 when Whoopi Goldberg played Ma (and it did NOT go well).
(Photos: Avalon)
