Mary J. ditches the diva to bare her soul: Queen of Hip Hop Soul tells BAZ BAMIGBOYE about her role in Netflix film Mudbound

Hip-hop soul queen Mary J. Blige threw everything she had into playing a cotton farmer’s wife

Hip-hop soul queen Mary J. Blige threw everything she had into playing a cotton farmer’s wife

Hip-hop soul queen Mary J. Blige threw everything she had into playing a cotton farmer’s wife battling to keep her family from being ripped apart in the post-war deep American South.

In the Netflix film Mudbound, Ms Blige plays Florence Jackson who, along with her husband and children, are subjected to horrifying acts of racism as they work in the cotton fields on the Mississippi Delta. She arrived on director Dee Rees’s set straight from performing on a Bad Boy Reunion tour.

‘I was fresh off the plane so it was hard adjusting. You don’t realise how vain you are until you have to play a character like Florence who’s stripped down to nothing,’ Ms Blige told me after she’d received back-to-back best supporting actress nominations from the Hollywood Foreign Press Association’s Golden Globe Awards and the Screen Actors Guild.

Initially, Blige resisted some of the director’s suggestions for how Florence should look. ‘Dee put her foot down and said, “Well, Florence needs to be natural and beautiful and strong.” She was insistent and said that she did not want Mary J. Blige. She wanted Florence. I fought a little, but then I understood her vision.’

That meant no wigs. ‘And no lashes. No nothing, except a little make-up to make me look a little older and like a sharecropper’s wife who’d been working in the blazing sun.

‘I realised I had nothing to lose so I gave everything I had. My good and my bad. I just let it all hang out — and playing her really liberated me,’ she added.

In the Netflix film Mudbound, Ms Blige plays Florence Jackson who, along with her husband and children, are subjected to horrifying acts of racism

In the Netflix film Mudbound, Ms Blige plays Florence Jackson who, along with her husband and children, are subjected to horrifying acts of racism

Mudbound is told from the point of view of members of two families — one black, one white — the film also stars a superb Carey Mulligan (above with Blige)

Mudbound is told from the point of view of members of two families — one black, one white — the film also stars a superb Carey Mulligan (above with Blige)

Whatever she gave Florence, it worked. When I first saw Mudbound at the Toronto International Film Festival I was stunned by how Blige was able to disappear completely into her role. Based on Hillary Jordan’s 2008 novel told from the point of view of members of two families — one black, one white — the film also stars a superb Carey Mulligan.

Though Blige was born in the Bronx, she lived for a time with her grandmother in Georgia. ‘My grandmother could be that woman (Florence)! Putting up with the racism. I was too young to fully know what was going on. Nothing I experienced relates to that,’ she said.

Blige will face strong competition from equally sublime performances by Allison Janney in I, Tonya and Laurie Metcalf in Lady Bird.

Blige said she wants to do more film work, but she’ll be back in the recording studio in 2018 to work on a new album.

‘That’s my baby. I’m not going to give that up.’

By George, they've got it says U.S. theatre supremo

Oskar Eustis, the artistic director of New York’s Public Theater, settled into a newly refurbished stalls seat at the Victoria Palace to watch the first preview of Hamilton, the revolutionary blockbuster musical.

Lin-Manuel Miranda’s show about Alexander Hamilton, one of America’s founding fathers, originated at the Public early in 2015 and has helped put the American musical back in the ascendant.

Eustis didn’t know how the show — or the British cast — would work here. ‘At the back of my parochial American mind, I was thinking: “We may have to compromise a little bit.”’

Oskar Eustis said the cast includes Michael Jibson as King George III (‘snide, dark and ironic...he’s so great!’)

Oskar Eustis said the cast includes Michael Jibson as King George III (‘snide, dark and ironic...he’s so great!’)

But within seconds he was biting his tongue. ‘The performances are spectacular,’ he declared when we met later in a hotel lounge in Covent Garden.

‘They were superb. They feel as if they own it,’ he said of the cast that includes Jamael Westman as Hamilton; Giles Terera as Aaron Burr; and Michael Jibson as King George III (‘snide, dark and ironic...he’s so great!’).

As if being invaded by one hit American musical is not enough, there’s soon going to be a second salvo from the old colony...in the form of Fun Home, another Tony-award winning musical which, like Hamilton, first wowed at the Public.

Hamilton’s official first night is Thursday; while the compelling Fun Home — based on Alison Bechdel’s graphic novel about how she became aware of her sexuality while growing up with her parents and siblings — arrives at the Young Vic on June 18. With music by Jeanine Tesori and book and lyrics by Lisa Kron, it charts a young girl’s relationship with a father who hides his sexual identity.

Mr Eustis, the artistic director of New York’s Public Theater, is pictured

Mr Eustis, the artistic director of New York’s Public Theater, is pictured

‘Two of the best shows I’ve ever worked on in my life,’ Eustis told me; adding that both works are deeply progressive (socially and politically), but also immensely popular (critically and commercially).

For a while, it was all one-away traffic: with Andrew Lloyd Webber and Cameron Mackintosh launching British shows across the Atlantic and onto Broadway.

Eustis smiled, allowing himself a moment of satisfaction. ‘And, of course, we all spend most of our time in the American theatre struggling with our combination of Anglophobia and Anglophilia. We feel a little chip on our shoulder with the Brits. And to come over with two shows that are this wonderful is something.’

Hamilton arrived at the Public after Miranda, along with director Thomas Kail and producer Jeffrey Seller, determined that it was the right place for it to start life. Eustis knew he wanted the musical after he saw a video of Miranda performing one song (well before he’d developed the piece into what it is now) for President Obama at the White House. Before that, he admitted, he had to be persuaded that Miranda was someone he should take seriously.

Hamilton is an undoubted phenomenon and even the Public’s small percentage of profits amounts to millions of dollars. That money flows back into the Public’s cash reserve — apart from $250,000, which goes into the theatre’s operating budget.

The Public is aptly named. It attracts considerable backing from individuals and corporations for ‘public works’ (of the theatrical kind): ranging from free performances at Shakespeare In The Park to its Mobile Unit, which brings the Bard to homeless shelters, community centres and prisons (they hope to perform in Spanish soon, and one day, Mandarin and South Asian languages).

Hamilton’s official first night is Thursday. Jamael Westman is pictured as Hamilton at the Victoria Palace Theatre

Hamilton’s official first night is Thursday. Jamael Westman is pictured as Hamilton at the Victoria Palace Theatre

Eustis has developed close ties with Rufus Norris at the National Theatre and helped the NT establish a unit called Public Acts.

Its first production will be Pericles, running at the Olivier from next August, with Emily Lim directing a company comprising a community ensemble and a few professional actors.

The Public’s collaborating on several other projects with the NT which will be announced over the next year or so.

We chatted about Vice President Pence’s visit to Hamilton in NY a couple of weeks after Donald Trump was elected.

The VP was booed. Eustis said he admired how Pence handled it. ‘He turned to his son and said: “That’s the sound of democracy, son.”’

Eustis said Pence’s behaviour was dignified. ‘It was his boss who went nuts on Twitter, not Pence.’

The compelling Fun Home  arrives at the Young Vic on June 18. 

The compelling Fun Home arrives at the Young Vic on June 18. 

The arts chief paused for a moment, then said: ‘We have allowed America to split in a way that none of us should have. There’s a huge number of people who feel totally left behind by what’s happening in the economy, in the arts, in education. They feel like there’s nothing in it for them.’

He added that it’s not an excuse to say ‘they don’t support the arts, so screw that: we don’t speak to them’. So now he’s going to do something about it.

Starting in a small way initially, the Public will tour Lynn Nottage’s resonant, Pulitzer-prize winning play Sweat — about a clash between blue collar workers over jobs — from next Autumn, ‘very specifically going to rural communities in the upper midwest...the so-called Rust Belt’.

The play will be performed in church halls and other small venues ‘to try and open up a dialogue with some of the people that I think, quite justifiably, feel angry at the America that’s ignored them’.

The revolutionary theatre chief added that the Public’s all about ‘erasing boundaries, bringing walls down’. 

 

Edwin Shaw, a box-office consultant and theatre wizard, retired yesterday after a 60-year career with the same theatre group. When he joined, it was called Moss Empires. Now, the group, or what’s left of it, is known as Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Really Useful Theatres - owners of the Theatre Royal Drury Lane and the London Palladium.

Shaw was leaving on a high, with Dick Whittington having sold £5.3 million worth of tickets for a five-week run.

Advertisement

Mary J. Blige ditches the diva to bare soul in Mudbound

The comments below have not been moderated.

The views expressed in the contents above are those of our users and do not necessarily reflect the views of MailOnline.

We are no longer accepting comments on this article.