THE PIANO LESSON Film to Be a 'Cinematic' Adaptation of the August Wilson Play

The upcoming adaptation of The Piano Lesson will mark a cinematic departure from the stage version.

In a new preview of The Piano Lesson on Vanity Fair, director Malcolm Washington discussed his approach to bringing the classic Wilson play to the screen. 

Co-writing the screenplay with Virgil Williams, Washington opened up the world of the story, utilizing flashbacks and other filmmaking techniques to sometimes take viewers out of the living room where the original play is set.

"Film is a completely different medium than stage. And with August Wilson specifically, each line, it's like Shakespeare. Each line of dialogue is like a poem unto itself, and you could make an entire movie just off a couple of his lines." Washington said.

Several actors from the 2022 Broadway production- Michael Potts, John David Washington, Ray Fisher, and Samuel L. Jackson- reprise their roles for the Netflix film, which Fisher calls a "class reunion...The same camaraderie that we had on Broadway we were able to bring to the movie."

John David Washington also admits that "Having been able to do it on stage, I feel so much more connected to the actors, the many African American actors and directors, like Lloyd Richards and his early collaborators and August Wilson."

The film version of August Wilson's The Piano Lesson will make its international premiere at the 49th edition of the Toronto International Film Festival, scheduled to run from September 5, 2024 to September 15, 2024. It will be released on Netflix later this year.

Read the full article at Vanity Fair.

Based on Wilson's play in his American Century Cycle, The Piano Lesson stars Samuel L. Jackson and John David Washington who reprise their roles from the 2022 Broadway revival. The cast also includes Ray Fisher, Danielle Deadwyler, Michael Potts and Corey Hawkins.

Grammy Award-winner Erykah Badu is set to make a musical cameo appearance in the film. Directed by Malcolm Washington, the film is expected to arrive on Netflix later this year.

August Wilson's The Piano Lesson, which premiered at the Yale Repertory Theatre in 1987 and starred a then-39-year-old Samuel L. Jackson as Boy Willie, is the fourth play in the American Century Cycle. Three years later, a new production, starring Carl Gordon, Charles S. Dutton and S. Epatha Merkerson, opened at Chicago’s Goodman Theatre, and soon transferred to Broadway’s Walter Kerr Theatre. In addition to winning the Pulitzer Prize for drama, The Piano Lesson won the New York Drama Critics’ Circle Award for Best Play, the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Play, the Peabody Award and was nominated for the 1990 Tony Award for Best Play.

The Piano Lesson is set in Pittsburgh's Hill District in 1936. A brother and sister are locked in a war over the fate of a family heirloom: a piano carved with the faces of their ancestors. Only by revisiting history can the siblings endeavor to move forward.

The 2022 revival of the play remains the highest-grossing revival of a play on Broadway and played a total of 124 regular performances (and 27 previews).

Photo Credit: Dominic Miller, Art Streiber