Netflix Launches Ma Rainey’s Melody Maker With NME

NME and Netflix are launching Ma Rainey’s Melody Maker to celebrate the premiere of Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom. The film is rolling on Netflix now and fans are enjoying some stirring performances by Viola Davis and Chadwick Boseman. Over at the NME site, you can travel back in time to 1927 to learn some more about the Blues singer’s world at the time. There are video discussions, playlists for extended viewing, and performance videos. It’s not hard to see why Ma Rainey’s story got adapted, as the period and her life are intensely vivid. The discussion around Davis’ performance has been absolutely stellar. Of course, a lot of fans are walking into this one with heavy hearts because of her co-star’s untimely passing.

Director George C. Wolfe talked to the Wall Street Journal about an emotional scene in the film that brought Boseman to tears.

“We were doing it in a very casual way, and I assumed that when Levee got to the big speech that Chadwick was going to stop. But he didn’t stop. He kept going, and Levee took over — it was raw and explosive,” Wolfe detailed. “Afterwards, Chadwick just started to sob, and Colman [Domingo] hugged him, and then Chadwick’s girlfriend basically picked him up.”

In the same WSJ piece, Davis maintained that fans would regard the Black Panther star as a real-life hero. The legend is already growing with his performance in the Netflix film.

“I think he is going to be remembered as a hero,” Davis explained. “There’s a part of the public that’s gonna associate that with Black Panther; I do not. I associate that with his authenticity, especially in the midst of a profession that sometimes can suck that out of you. He was a person who lived a life bigger than themselves. I think that his legacy, his body of work, his integrity, is going to influence on generations upon generations to come.”

Comicbook.com’s already reviewed Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom and enjoyed the ride. Chadwick Boseman’s final performance is bound to bring some emotions out of viewers.

“It’s not novel to point out that it’s a tragedy this film is Chadwick Boseman’s final appearance in a feature, but his work in the movie serves as a constant reminder of what a gift he had and how much talent he was prepared to deliver to us, the viewers, throughout his career,” Spencer Perry wrote. “What we can be thankful for is that his final two performances, Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom and Da 5 Bloods, can be watched by the world at a moment’s notice on Netflix. Watch them both and be richer for it, he made these for us.”

Have you already checked out Ma Rainey? Let us know down in the comments!