Aaliyah fans will forever wonder what could have become of the performer’s life and career had she not died tragically in a plane crash 13 years ago.
Much like the 22-year-old’s legacy, the Lifetime movie “Aaliyah: The Princess of R&B,” is riddled with untapped potential. Instead of digging deep and edifying audiences about segments of the singer and actress’ life that haven’t been covered in a half a dozen music documentaries and specials, the made-for-TV flick premieres Saturday and is serviceable but non-revelatory.
Alexandra Shipp (“Drumline: A New Beat” and “House of Anubis”) is winsome in her portrayal of the woman born Aaliyah Haughton and is perfectly believable as an ambitious but introverted tomboy on the verge of international fame and acclaim.
Rachael Crawford (“The Strain”), Sterling Jarvis (“Nikita”), A.J. Saudin (“Degrassi: The Next Generation”), and Lyriq Bent (“Rookie Blue”) also turn in convincing performances as Aaliyah’s mother, father, brother and uncle respectively.
Crawford is especially compelling as a mom determined to protect her daughter while helping her pursue her dreams. Meanwhile, Elise Neal (“The Hughleys”) makes a brief but impressive appearance as Gladys Knight.
All of these actors’ performances are especially profound when one considers the awkward and stunted dialogue they had to work with in “Aaliyah: The Princess of R&B.”
For instance, in one scene when Aaliyah tells her mentor and eventual husband R. Kelly (Cle Bennett) — the result of a swift and illegal marriage, since she was only 15 — that he barely acknowledged her during her initial audition for him, he actually says, “You ain’t got to look at the sun to know that it’s shining.”
Yipes! Even if R. Kelly said this in real life — and hopefully he didn’t — it’s up to the writers to wipe away the detritus of warmed over soul songs and give TV audiences words they can relate to and feel. It’s not about securing the rights to every song the woman sang. It’s about crafting a tale that can live on the way Aaliyah’s chart-topping tunes have.
After all, a lot of people idolized the rising star from her hometown of Detroit to England. Aaliyah wasn’t just a R&B singer trying to break into movies. She was an approachable, Grammy-nominated scene stealer who performed at the Oscars. She was one of the big A’s — Aretha, Anita and Aaliyah — to come out of the Motorcity. Sadly, the one or two montages used to convey Aaliyah’s whirlwind career, touring schedule and ever-growing fan adulation don’t cut it either.
While Shipp and Bennett have tangible chemistry as ill-fated lovers — which is more than can be said for the connection-free interactions between Shipp and Anthony Grant who co-stars as boyfriend and music mogul Damon Dash — the bald cap Bennett sports is so detectable and rubbery it’s comedic. Grant also wears a noticeably cheap bald cap. Why didn’t the producers just pay a little extra for a barber who could shave these dudes’ heads?
Sure, this is a negligible detail but it’s the little things that separate well-executed TV movies from glorified reenactments.
The thing is that pretty much sums up “Aaliyah: The Princess of R&B” in a nutshell. Despite a handful of great performances, this small-screen drama is a forgettable, overly publicized splash in the pan unworthy of the woman it earnestly but clumsily attempts to honor. What a shame.
“Aaliyah: The Princess of R&B” airs Saturday at 8 p.m. ET on Lifetime.
40 Best and Worst Actors Playing Real-Life Musicians (Photos)
The 1950s biopic “The Glenn Miller Story” took substantial liberties with the real story, but Jimmy Stewart was persuasive enough as the star bandleader to make the movie a big hit.
Universal
If you’re looking for somebody to play Hank Williams, the haunted, skeletal composer of such heartbreak classics as this 1964 movie’s title track, “Your Cheatin’ Heart,” George Hamilton is not exactly the guy who first springs to mind.
MGM
We knew Diana Ross could sing after her string of hits in the ‘60s, but we didn’t know she could act until she made an astounding film debut as the tortured Billie Holiday in 1972's “Lady Sings the Blues.”
Paramount Pictures
Director Ken Russell’s thesis in 1975's “Lisztomania” was that classical composers were the rock stars of their day, so he enlisted real rock star Roger Daltrey to mug his way through an overheated extravaganza about Franz Liszt.
Warner Bros.
“Bound for Glory,” a lavishly fictionalized 1976 recounting of the life of troubadour Woody Guthrie was nominated for six Oscars and won two – and it moved David Carradine, briefly, from a TV lead who made B movies to an unconventional movie star.
United Artists
Before he was a made-for-TV wacko, Gary Busey was a pretty fine actor – and never better than when he played the title role in 1978's “The Buddy Holly Story,” a biopic of the ‘50s rock star whose life ended early.
Columbia
As a kid, Kurt Russell acted alongside Elvis Presley in “It Happened at the World’s Fair.” As an adult, he got to act like the King of Rock ‘n’ Roll in the 1979 TV miniseries “Elvis.”
Dick Clark Productions
No, she’s not actually playing Janis Joplin -- but Bette Midler’s powerhouse performance in "The Rose" as a fearsomely talented, self-destructive and very Joplin-esque singer was the closest we’ve gotten to Janis onscreen, despite numerous recent efforts.
Fox
A lot of real country singers appeared in Michael Apted’s 1980 Loretta Lynn biopic “Coal Miner’s Daughter,” but actress Sissy Spacek took the central role (and the Oscar) after being personally chosen by Lynn.
Universal
“Amadeus” (1984) took its title from Mozart’s middle name, and Tom Hulce was just fine as the bratty prodigy – but this is Salieri’s story, and F. Murray Abraham’s movie.
Orion Pictures
Par for the course in musical biopics, 1985's “Sweet Dreams” was attacked for the liberties it took with the true story – but Jessica Lange was persuasive enough to land her fourth Oscar nomination as Patsy Cline.
TriStar
Gary Oldman has said he doesn’t like his haunted and ferocious performance as the self-destructive and ill-fated Sex Pistols bassist Sid Vicious in 1986's “Sid & Nancy,” but most would disagree with him.
Samuel Goldwyn
Lou Diamond Phillips, meanwhile, burst onto the scene in 1987's “La Bamba” as Richie Valens, another rocker who died in the same plane crash that killed Holly.
Columbia
Decades before Clint Eastwood’s so-so “Jersey Boys,” he hit the right notes with 1988's “Bird,” his look at jazz titan Charlie Parker – and Forest Whitaker’s quiet but towering performance won him the Best Actor award at Cannes in 1988.
Warner Bros.
T Bone Burnett, who worked on 1989's "Great Balls of Fire," which starred an over-the-top Dennis Quaid as Jerry Lee Lewis, once lamented that this cartoonish romp “made it look like the Dukes of Hazzard invented rock ‘n’ roll.”
Orion Picutres
Perhaps the excesses of Oliver Stone’s 1991 film “The Doors” aren’t far removed from the excesses of its subject, Jim Morrison. Val Kilmer embraces them all with deranged gusto.
TriStar
Both Angela Bassett and co-star Laurence Fishburne received Oscar nominations for their roles as Tina Turner and her abusive husband Ike in 1993's “What’s Love Got To Do With It,” and Bassett won the Golden Globe for her fierce performance in a role first offered to Whitney Houston.
Buena Vista
The character is identified as “Mentor” in the credits of Quentin Tarantino's 1993 film "True Romance," but we all know (and love) the apparition, played by Val Kilmer, who pushes Christian Slater to stand up to Gary Oldman’s dreadlocked pimp: It's the ghost of Elvis, of course.
Warner Bros.
Stephen Dorff was so impressive as original Beatles bassist Stu Sutcliffe in 1994's “Backbeat” that no less an authority than Paul McCartney, who otherwise hated the film, called him “astonishing.”
Gramercy
From a Sex Pistol to classical icon Ludwig Van Beethoven in 1994's “Immortal Beloved,” Oldman shows the broadest range of anybody on this list. But his randy Ludwig Van isn’t one of his best showcases.
Sony/Columbia
Fans of the Mexican-American singer Selena were upset that a New Yorker of Puerto Rican descent, Jennifer Lopez, was chosen for the title role in 1997's “Selena” – but J-Lo’s star-making performance silenced most of the critics.
Warner Bros.
In 2002's wondrously weird rock ‘n’ roll mummy movie "Bubba Ho-Tep," Bruce Campbell gives us an aging, decrepit Elvis who can still gloriously kick butt.
Vitagraph
OK, we admit it: We haven’t seen 2003's “The Night We Called It a Day.” But Dennis Hopper as Frank Sinatra? The prospect is too weird, and too delicious, to ignore.
ContentFilm International
Kevin Spacey directed, co-wrote and co-produced 2004 “Beyond the Sea,” as well as starring as ‘50s and ‘60s pop singer Bobby Darin – even though Darin died at the age of 37, making the 44-year-old Spacey’s performance problematic at times.
Lions Gate
Jamie Foxx’s career-making, Oscar-winning performance as Ray Charles in 2004's "Ray" launched the former “In Living Color” performer to a whole new level of stardom.
Universal
Joaquin Phoenix didn’t exactly sing like Johnny Cash in 2005's "Walk the Line" (no one can), but he captured some man-in-blackish essence, and Reese Witherspoon won the Oscar as June Carter.
Marion Cotillard won the Oscar for "La Vie en Rose," the first movie in which many Stateside viewers saw her – not that they’d recognize her under the makeup that transformed her into tiny, tortured chanteuse Edith Piaf.
Photographer-turned-director Anton Corbijn's moody black-and-white touch was just right for 2007's "Control," a story of the seminal post-punk band Joy Division starring Sam Riley as Ian Curtis, the singer who struggled to cope with success and with life.
Weinstein Company
Michael Shannon’s performance as Sunset Strip Svengali Kim Fowley is the standout in the middling 2010 movie “The Runaways”; Kristen Stewart and Dakota Fanning didn’t particularly stand out as Joan Jett and Cherie Currie, respectively.
Apparition
Alan Rickman survives 2013's “CBGB” relatively intact as the proprietor of a legendary ‘70s punk dive – but the poor actors roped into standing in for the stars of the scene, Malin Akerman as Debbie Harry among them, don’t fare nearly so well.
Xlrator Media
Clint Eastwood won kudos from theater fans for tapping Broadway stars for his movie adaptation of 2014's "Jersey Boys," but John Lloyd Young was a better singer and stage performer than actor in his performance as Frankie Valli.
Warner Bros.
In "Jimi: All Is By My Side," John Ridley’s upcoming, unorthodox year-in-the-life Jimi Hendrix story, former Outkast singer Andre Benjamin captures the spacey, dreamy side of a rock icon who lived in a purple haze.
Open Road
Chadwick Boseman has the moves and the hair to play James Brown in "Get On Up" – and when you’re playing the Godfather of Soul, those two things will take you all the way to funkytown.
Universal
Ethan Hawke stars in another adventurous film about a jazz legend, the Chet Baker fantasia “Born to Be Blue.” Like Baker’s music, the film (and Hawke’s performance) is dreamy, ethereal and heartbreaking.
Entertainment One
Haunted-looking and skeletal, Tom Hiddleston makes a convincing Hank Williams (and a creditable country singer) in “I Saw the Light,” but the conventional film is far more interested in drugs and booze than in Williams' brilliant music.
Sony Pictures Classics
“Miles Ahead,” actor-director Don Cheadle’s unconventional film about the jazz trumpeter Miles Davis, is odd and audacious – in other words, the kind of movie you should make if you’re going to make a movie about the revolutionary and unconventional musician.
Sony Pictures Classics
Zoe Saldana is a light-skinned woman of Puerto Rican and Dominican descent, which has made her casting as the dark-skinned African American singer and civil rights activist Nina Simone a highly controversial one.
RLJ Entertainment
Michael Shannon plays the king of rock ‘n’ roll in the upcoming “Elvis & Nixon,” a comedic look at the 1970 meeting between Elvis Presley and U.S. President Richard Nixon (Kevin Spacey), at which Presley badgered Nixon into giving him a Drug Enforcement Administration badge.
Tribeca Film Festival
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Tom Hiddleston, Don Cheadle, Ethan Hawke and Zoe Saldana are latest among the hundreds of actors who’ve tried playing musicians on screen
The 1950s biopic “The Glenn Miller Story” took substantial liberties with the real story, but Jimmy Stewart was persuasive enough as the star bandleader to make the movie a big hit.