Ma Rainey
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Ma Rainey's Black Bottom (2020) View more photos Movie Info Synopsis Tensions and temperatures rise at a Chicago music studio in 1927 when fiery, fearless blues singer Ma Rainey joins her...
- (319)
- George C. Wolfe
- R
- Viola Davis
Adapted from two-time Pulitzer Prize winner August Wilson's play, MA RAINEY'S BLACK BOTTOM celebrates the transformative power of the blues and the artists who refuse to let society's prejudices dictate their worth.
Watch Ma Rainey's Black Bottom: A Legacy Brought to Screen | Netflix Official Site. Viola Davis, Denzel Washington, George C. Wolfe and more share the heart, soul and history that brought August Wilson’s timeless play to the screen. Watch trailers & learn more.
- 31 min
Tensions and temperatures rise at a Chicago music studio in 1927 when fiery, fearless blues singer Ma Rainey joins her band for a recording session. Watch trailers & learn more.
- Rainey Was A Musical Innovator
- She Was A Formative Storyteller of The Black Female Experience
- She Challenged Sexual Norms
- Rainey Was A Fashion Icon
- Rainey Was A Shrewd Entrepreneur—But Still A Victim of Exploitation
In the new film, Rainey’s style of blues is portrayed as archaic compared to the faster hot jazz preferred by her young band member Levee (Chadwick Boseman). While this contrast may have rung true in the late ‘20s, it was Rainey who was pioneering a new sound just a few years earlier. That style is now known as “classic blues”—but at the time, it w...
Rainey didn’t just popularize the genre of classic blues: she helped write it. While other blues singers of the day, like Bessie Smith and Mamie Smith, largely sang songs written by others, Rainey penned at least one third of the songs she recorded. Many of those, like “Moonshine Blues” and “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom,” would become standards of the ...
Rainey gleefully leaned into in the sexual revolution of the Roaring Twenties, excelling at writing and performing the types of double entendres often used at the time. (The title song of “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom,” for instance, refers both to sex as well as the Black neighborhoods of cities across the country, including Detroit.) Rainey sang abou...
Suits were far from the only fashion statement that Rainey made during her performing career. Long before bling was in vogue (or even a word), Rainey traveled with four trunks full of accessories which included ostrich plumes, sequins and jewelry. Onstage, she wore satin gowns and diamond tiaras; a necklace of gold coins often hung from her neck. “...
Thanks to her showmanship, songwriting and powerful voice, Rainey earned a reputation as one of the most dynamic performers in America in the 1920s, and her tour earnings reflected that popularity. She and her band could make a sizable $350 a week on tour with the Theater Owners’ Booking Association (for comparison, George Williams and Bessie Brown...
- 2 min
- Andrew R. Chow
Dec 18, 2020 · It’s hard not to watch “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom,” the vibrant adaptation of August Wilson’s play of the same name, now streaming on Netflix, without feeling a sense of loss.
Oct 20, 2020 · With his career cut short, it seems that Netflix's upcoming Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, an adaptation of the famed August Wilson play, will be Boseman's last film. Here's what we know about the...
