Pop Culture Happy Hour - The Piano Lesson

Episode Date: November 26, 2024

You may not see Denzel Washington in the new Netflix film adaptation of the August Wilson play The Piano Lesson, but his influence as producer – and parent – is unmistakable. Denzel's son Malcolm Washington is the director, and his son John David Washington plays one of the leads alongside Danielle Deadwyler and Samuel L. Jackson. It's a story about family, legacy and community. And the hauntings both literal and figurative make a big impression.Follow Pop Culture Happy Hour on Letterboxd at letterboxd.com/nprpopculture.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

You may not see Denzel Washington in the new film adaptation of the August Wilson play The Piano Lesson, but his influence as producer and parent is unmistakable. That makes sense in a story about family, legacy, and community. Denzel's son Malcolm is the director, and his son John David, plays one of the leads alongside Daniel Deadweiler. And this story of hauntings, both literal and figurative, makes a big impression. I'm Aisha Harris. And I'm Linda Holmes.

And today we're talking about. The Piano Lesson on Pop Culture Happy Hour from NPR. It's just the two of us today. In 2015, Denzel Washington announced that he would produce 10 film adaptations of August Wilson's plays, beginning with fences, which he would direct and in which he would star. After that, he produced Ma Rainey's Black Bottom in 2020, and the third film in the project is The Piano Lesson. Washington's son Malcolm directed and also co-wrote the screenplay with Virgil Williams. The film stars Washington's other son, John David Washington, as Boy Willie.

Boy Willie returns to his family home where his sister Bernice has custody of a beloved piano that's profoundly connected to the family's history. The piano was originally owned by a man named Sutter whose family enslaved some of Boy Willie's ancestors. Boy Willie is back because he wants to sell it and buy a piece of land. Bernice, played by Danielle Deadweiler, won't even consider selling, and the conflict becomes intense. If I was you, I get rid of it. That's the way to get rid of Sutter's ghost. Get rid of that piano.

I want you and Lyman to take all of this confusion out of my house. The film also stars Samuel L. Jackson as Doaker, Bernice and Boy Willie's uncle, who lives with Bernice but wants no part of their fight. You need to bless that piano if you're going to bless anything. It ain't done nothing but cause trouble. You're going to bless anything. Go on bless that. The piano lesson is streaming now on Netflix.

I have held back from talking about this with Aisha off, Mike, because I was very curious to get into this conversation. What did you think of this? Well, I mean, as with all stage to movie adaptations, there's a specific kind of challenge that arises, which is how do you make this feel different from this stage? How do you make it feel cinematic? How do you make it feel like it's moving? And I think this is especially true when we're talking about someone like August Wilson, who his plays are very much steeped in the oral tradition. And so there's action. There are interpersonal conflicts that happen on stage in the realm of his stories.

But then there's also usually there is at least one scene or a couple of scenes where you have someone who is talking about something that happened in the past that happened off stage. Yes. That oral tradition and that like emphasis on oral history can be hard to render on screen. And I think that this movie, like when it starts off, honestly, Anytime I'm watching something like in August Wilson production, I also think of the adaptation of Fences and then also the adaptation of Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, you have to sort of like ease into it or like get used to it because there is a way, there is a dialogue. It's hard not for it to feel somewhat like stagey in a performance. I don't necessarily mean that as a bad thing. But like there is a cadence and there is a way that they talk.

It's a dialogue that has a style. It's a dialogue that has a style and it's a dialogue of the past. And so you have to ease into that. And I think some actors in this adaptation are more successful at it than others. But overall, I think the way that Malcolm Washington tries to make this feel cinematic does work, especially a scene with Doaker, the Samuel O'Jackson character, where he is recounting the history of this piano. I think it really works because we have those moments where we are actually seeing the action on screen. And it does bring it to life in interesting ways. So, I mean, overall, I think this is a pretty successful adaptation, and I'm very curious, Linda, to hear what you think about this. Yeah. You know, I had sort of complicated feelings about it, and I do want to say, like, I think a playwright like August Wilson, there's scholarship around him and his plays that I have not done as much of as a lot of other people have. You know, I have seen a certain number of his plays, mostly through adaptations of different kinds. I read the play, and I,

read a foreword that was written by Tony Morrison in the version that I read in the edition that I read. So I recommend that first. That's a good starting point, I think, to try to help you kind of locate yourself in the August Wilson body of work, right? I had mixed feelings about what you're talking about with like seeing the scenes from the past because the whole story here rotates in part on an axis of this moment in which I'm not going to not talk. about spoilers and stuff like that because this is a play that's been around since the 80s and whatever. It all kind of shifts on this axis of this moment when Bernice and Boy Willie's father took this piano from Sutter, the person who owned it at the time. And there's a much bigger history to it than that. But that lifting of the piano, they show you right at the top of the movie. And I wondered whether I would have preferred to learn about that from the, as you described, that wonderful scene.

with Samuel L. Jackson, where he describes what happened and talks about it. I started to call my granddad up to the house and told him to carve a picture of my grandmother and my daddy on the piano for Miss Ophelia, and he took and done this. You see that? That's my grandmother. Bernice. I wasn't sure whether I needed to actually see all these things as opposed to having them described because so much of this story is about.

the telling of stories, right? But I wasn't against it because like you said, it's sort of how do you make it different from the play? How do you make it cinematic? How do you kind of use the tools that you have in making a film that you don't have in writing a play to enhance it? And it's not that I think they didn't or that I think they heard it. It just was for me, interesting to think about like whether I really needed to see that heist of the piano versus having them describe it in the way that the story's been told in the family. Yeah, well, I can understand that perspective, and I think it is sort of a year mileage may vary sort of situation. I do think Malcolm Washington, the director, he comes back to those moments multiple times throughout the movie. And there's sort of a reveal that happens as to like, it's not a montage exactly, but there's like a moment where you're seeing someone sitting, like their perspective, they're sitting in like what looks like a train car. But you're not entirely sure like why that's there. And we come back to it later. And so I feel like the ending shot. the ending scenes, like, it ties it all together for me.

But I can also understand how like that, at least that opening sequence maybe feels overreaching a little bit. Yeah. And, you know, there's an interesting thing because this story does, you know, as we talked about in the intro, it's kind of this idea that the family is kind of haunted by this story of Sutter and the piano. And of course, of the history of enslavement of some of the ancestors of Bernice and boy Willie. And eventually that haunting becomes kind of literal, which I wasn't necessarily expecting

when I first started watching this because there's this suggestion that Bernice and her daughter like see Sutter's Ghost around the house. And Doker too at some point. Yeah. And Doker too eventually. Yeah. To me it's an interesting question. I was like, oh, I wonder if it's ambiguous whether that's real or not, whether that's like literally true. But it is literally true that the place is haunted by Sutter's Ghost, which I thought was a really interesting choice. But again, when I was trying to picture what it would have been like as a play, it was interesting to think about like how much of what you see in the film that makes that haunting literal could have been on stage. Do you know what I mean? Unfortunately, I've never seen a full stage production of this,

but I have read it multiple times and in my acting class in undergrad, we, I did have to do a scene from that. And so I'm familiar with the text, but it is interesting to think about how the movie and the play connect to the supernatural. You know, August Wilson, so much of what his canon is, is these wrestlings with supernatural, yes, but also just like this idea of ancestry and of spirit and of how those things are passed down through different generations. It was interesting because, like, I haven't actually encountered the piano lesson in probably at least 15 years. years now. It's been a while. So it wasn't quite fresh in my mind. And while I was watching it, I was like, oh, man, this reminds me so much of a Raisin in the Sun, the Lorraine Hansberry play. Because when you think about it, at the center of both of these plays, is this sort of ideological debate around a specific item or like inheritance that is passed down within the family? And Raisin in the Sun, it's an insurance

check that's left by the deceased patriarch of the younger family and how that causes a lot of turmoil amongst the various family members. And then here it's this piano and the fact that in both these plays and in this movie, there's like a gender divide. Doaker's kind of in the middle of it and he's kind of neutral, although he's like, look, I'm not going to deal with this, but also Bernice has a point to some extent. Well, and it's her house and he lives with her. Exactly, exactly.

So it's just like really fascinating to me to think about those connections. And funny enough, like both of the original productions of these plays were actually directed by the same person. and Lloyd Richards. So there is this interesting tie there and this tie of like masculinity in the boy Willie character of like ownership in the same way that Walter Lee and a Raisin on the Sun is like that. Well, speaking of Boy Willie, though, I want to talk about John David Washington's performance. I'm curious how you feel about this. And then like the other performances more broadly. So what I felt about this performance is I think he comes into this at a very kind of a cranked-up pitch of a young man who is really intense about everything,

really angry, which obviously is part of the character. I'm not complaining about that. And then sort of stays at that pitch kind of throughout. Papa boy Charles brought that piano into the house. Now, I'm supposed to build on what they left me. Can't do nothing with that piano letting it sit up there in the house. That'd be like if I let their watermelons sit out there and rock. I'd be a fool.

Maybe if it was a little bit turned down at the beginning, it would leave a little bit more space because you always want space for kind of the dynamic range kind of stuff to happen. Yeah. Yeah. And candidly, I think that happens a little bit to Danielle Deadweiler, too. I think both of them kind of begin at the level of intensity where the play is trying to build to. And I think that's a little bit challenging. And what was really interesting to me, although I haven't seen the stage play, I did watch parts of a TV. movie version from the 90s, right?

Yeah, with Charles S. Dutton, who played Boy Willie for ages. Yes. It's funny because it's hard for me to put my finger on why his approach is different to me because he's also a really, like, hyped up young dude, right? Yeah. But it's a different take. And Alphrey Woodard played Bernice in that TV piece. Yeah.

She's a little more kind of like waiting for the conflict to come as opposed to feeling like they both come into the conflict already at a high level, which I think is sort of the decision that they made here. I don't know. What did you think? To me, I think the Daniel Deadweiler choice makes a little bit more sense just because if you think about these characters, even though this is the first time we're seeing them, there's a history there. You could understand why she would, like, as soon as she sees them, she's like, what are you doing here? Whereas with the John David Washington character with Boy Willie, it does feel a little bit like he's just like coming in at 100 and it's just like too much. This movie made me realize that John David Washington,

he is inconsistent for me. Yeah. I have yet to see a performance of his where I was with him from beginning to end. I'm thinking there's a lot of similar things happening here that happened in Malcolm and Marie, that very awful movie with Zendaya. It is that issue where like there is no nuance or variability there. I think he gets a little bit better towards the end. There is a sequence. He's having this conversation about like how she's talking to her daughter and he's explaining why he doesn't have any interest in having children. And it seems like he has found the authenticity or like the real cadence of the role in a way that he did in earlier. But yeah, it's so fascinating to me because it's like sometimes he even sounds so much like his

father. Yeah. But it doesn't translate to what I'm seeing on screen. Like it's just very weird. Yeah. And disorienting. You know, for me, he is somebody who I have not seen from him as many settings as I have from a lot of other people. So if one of the settings that he operates on is just right for that scene, I think he can be really terrific. But there are times when I feel like I want there to be more rise and fall, I guess I would say, in the performance.

Great way to frame it, yeah. And I think that Charles S. Dutton is a great example of somebody who has all kinds of rise and fall, all kinds of, you know, comedic, dramatic, intensity, kind of so many different ways of doing things that maybe that's why when I saw the parts of the play with him, I was more drawn to that kind of way of seeing it. I will say there are a bunch of performances here that I think are quite good, and there's a good amount of overlap here between the casting of this film and the casting of a 22 Broadway Revival in which John David Washington played Boy Willie, Ray Fisher played Lyman.

Interestingly enough, Danielle Brooks played Bernice, which I would have been really interested to see. Sort of my favorite performance in this, I think, is Samuel L. Jackson, who played Doaker in that Broadway revival as well, and who kind of like my favorite fact about this is that Jackson has this deep, deep, deep history with this play originated the role of Boy Willie not on Broadway, but before that, at the Yale Repertory Theater, which is where the... My parents saw that production, yeah. Really? That is so exciting.

Yeah, like, pretty sure they saw that one. Yeah. Yeah. Then, when it was on Broadway, he understudied Boy Willie and Lyman. I found it really wonderful to see him in this because he has had such a tremendous and fun career playing a lot of, like, big parts. I think his familiarity and long history with this play is really evident. Yes. And there's so much understanding of the weight on the family and also of his, of doker's desire to just get that weight off of them.

Yes. If that makes sense, by sort of whatever way is going to work. Yeah, this is a very different kind of Samuel O. Jackson performance. And I think it will remind people that he has range. He doesn't just play sort of, you know, badass men who curse a lot. It's a theater guy. He's a theater guy and he is playing a character who is noticeably older. Like, I mean, he's in his 70s now, I think.

And like, he feels older and he feels wiser and he also feels weirier than I think we're usually seeing in a Samuel L. Jackson before. Not always, but usually. Yeah. I also love Corey Hawkins, who also has a very deep theater background. as Avery because... I saw Corey Hawkins in Six Degrees of Separation. I would have loved to see that. Like, yeah, he's just one of those actors who, whenever he comes on screen,

like, I know he's going to be great no matter what is happening. And, like, the first time we see him, he enters into the house and he spots Lyman and Boy Willie for the first time. And he just, like, has this way where you can see the shock, the unease registering over his face. But he's trying not to let it appear in his face. Like, you understand how. like what he is trying to do. Right. And his scene with Bernice later on where he's just like pleading with her, like, why won't

you marry me? That and her scene that she has with Lyman, played by Ray Fisher, who is also, I think, really great in this. Those two scenes to me were the ones that like felt the most intimate, felt the most naturalistic and just felt like, oh, I understand where each of these characters is coming from. Yeah. I think there's a lot of really lovely moments in this.

Yeah. I do agree with you about that Corey Hawkins performance because Avery, that character of this preacher who is kind of begging Bernice to marry him and also has to really be the one who tries to do a very literal blessing of the house that kind of introduces the supernatural elements of the thing. That role could so easily be kind of clowny or like it could be like that he's a ridiculous person. it could go down that road. And it just never feels that way. The other thing that I wanted to ask you about, because I was curious how you felt about it, in some of the takes that I read on sort of understanding the play,

they presented it as a pretty straightforward situation where Boy Willie represents people who kind of like don't understand the importance of their history and kind of present him as unambiguously wrong about wanting to sell the piano. It's not that I don't understand that, but I feel like it's a more interesting question than that. When he's talking about this is what they had to leave us is this piano, particularly if you're not using it. Because she has stopped playing it.

If you're not using it, if I can sell it and make a life for myself, that seems more logical. I mean, I think it's just a more interesting question than that. Yeah. I don't think August, and I, granted, I haven't read everything. everything he said about and written about the play and how we're supposed to interpret it. But I don't think it was meant to be unambiguous. Like, I don't think he's unambiguously wrong. Like, I think the blessing and the curse of, like, being a black person in America, which is that like, both him and Bernice have points. Like, she is saying, well, my father died for this piano and

this did something to our family. It also did something to my mother. It broke her heart. And for that reason, like, we can't get rid of this. This is our history. But then you also get his point where it's just like, but also we need to live in this world. Yes, there's the ideological standpoint, but there's also the practical standpoint of like, I'm trying to buy this land. This land will give me a future, ideally.

Options, yeah. But like whether or not he takes the piano at the end is not the point. It is the point that they both have to confront their insecurities and their demon. And she has to confront the fact that like she hasn't played this piano. She's been afraid to play it for so long, which August Wilson ties back to the trauma and all of that. And then also he has to wrestle with his ideas around masculinity, again, being tied to ownership of land. All of them are dealing with the loss of their father. And she's also dealing with the loss of her husband, who she blames boy Willie.

Right. What makes this play work so well is the fact that there are no sense. straightforward answers. There's just characters who are trying to work through all this history and all this trauma. And that is to me why I would not say that this is like, like he is absolutely wrong. Yeah. I'm surprised that there are some people who think that like there is a right or wrong answer. But I will be curious to see where they go with this kind of series of plays. Because originally Denzel Washington's plan was, or what he said his plan was at the time, was like, we're going to do one a year. I never want to. praise things for like being noble causes because it sounds infantilizing and kind of unfair to

the actual merits of the thing. But I do really think this kind of project where somebody who is super famous and super powerful decides to kind of commit to a project that is about the introduction or reintroduction of pieces that are not maybe as commercial in this moment as, you know, it was for him to do training day. Like, I think that's ultimately a good thing. And even if there are, you know, things about this that probably I would adjust a little bit. Yeah. There are other things about it that I'm just so incredibly glad I saw it.

And I'm super glad they made it. And I'm glad they're going to continue to make these. Yeah. I think what Denzo Washington is trying to do is try to sort of preserve August Wilson's legacy because, you know, he's still getting produced. That's not like something to be concerned about. You can go to see a show, but there are also so many people who will never go to the theater. And this is just a way to keep his spirit alive.

And I appreciate that. And so far, I think the three movies that have come out of this, they're all varying degrees of successful, I think. But none of them have been, in my opinion, terrible. So that's a win. Yep. I agree. I agree. Well, we want to know what you think about the piano lesson.

and find us on Facebook at Facebook.com slash PCH and on Letterbox at letterbox.com slash NPR pop culture. We'll have a link in our episode description. And that brings us to the end of our show. Aisha Harris, my friend, it is always so good to be with you. Thank you so much for being here. Same. Thank you. This episode is produced by Hufza Fathema and edited by Mike Katzif. Our supervising producer is Jessica Reedy. Hello. Come in provides our theme music. Thank you for listening to Pop Culture Happy Hour from NPR. I'm Linda Holmes. and we'll see you all tomorrow.