Erykah Badu lands role in Netflix adaptation of The Piano Lesson

Dallas music icon Erykah Badu has secured a musical cameo role in Netflix drama The Piano Lesson alongside major Hollywood stars.

The 52-year-old singer is set to appear in the forthcoming adaptation of the August Wilson play, performing music in a small role alongside stars Samuel L. Jackson and John David Washington. The pair are reprising their roles from the play’s recent Tony Award-winning Broadway revival.

The story is set in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in 1936, and follows the lives of the Charles family, which possesses a family heirloom—the titular piano—adorned with carvings made by an enslaved ancestor documenting the family’s history.

The Piano Lesson is part of Wilson’s 10-play “American Century Cycle,” which includes Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, which Netflix adapted in 2020 (starring Chadwick Boseman in his final role), and Fences, adapted by (and starring) Denzel Washington in 2016.

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Published originally in 1987, Wilson began writing this play by playing with the various answers regarding the possibility of "acquir[ing] a sense of self-worth by denying one's past".

Badu is set to embark on The Unfollow Me Tour next month with Yasiin Bey. Late last year she shared a collaboration with BTS’ RM for the K-pop vocalist’s solo album Indigo.

Badu rose to prominence in the late 1990s when her debut album Baduizm (1997), placed her at the forefront of the neo-soul movement. The Texan's career began after she opened a show for D'Angelo in 1994 in Fort Worth, leading to record label executive Kedar Massenburg signing her to Kedar Entertainment.

As an actress, she has played a number of supporting roles in movies including Blues Brothers 2000, The Cider House Rules and House of D. She also has appeared in the documentaries Before the Music Dies and The Black Power Mixtape 1967-1975.