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as Grace’s assistant to full-fledged music producer, bucking a sexist system and her own insecurities along the way. Her riseof-the-assistant dramedy is pleasant but predictable. Where the film rises above is in its Tracee Ellis Ross and Dakota Johnson make a formidable team depiction of Maggie as a true-blue music lover, driven by a passion to create emoas a pop diva and her girl Friday in sweetly soulful tional moments through songs like the The High Note. By André Hereford soul classics that grace the soundtrack. Any script can talk the talk of rock ’n’ ADIES AND GENTLEMEN, MISS ROSS HAS ENTERED THE BUILDING. roll trivia and obscure B-sides, but Late That would be Tracee Ellis Ross, of course — a consistently leading light on ABC’s Night director Nisha Ganatra — working long-running hit sitcom Black-ish, and a believable singing superstar in her fluid astutely in the vein of female bonding performance as fictional pop/R&B artist Grace Davis in The High Note (HHHHH). One and ambition — grounds these characters could imagine that from the start of her award-winning acting career, Ross might have in a world that sincerely appreciates the dreamed of and dreaded playing a role that would invite such exact comparisons to her power of the right lyric or melody. Musicsupremely famous mother. Yet, she carries that legacy with apparent ease, offering a love underscores the film’s sexy romance sharp, nuanced take on a legendary songstress who may be aging out of the pop spotlight. between Maggie and an enigmatic R&B While singer/songwriter Grace Davis still has her heart set on creating new music, up-and-comer named David (Waves star Kelvin Harrison, Jr.) whom she her record company is ready to shuffle her act off to a lucrative Click Here to angles to produce. Vegas residency performing her old hits. Think of Celine Dion, Thanks in part to the they tell her. The movie makes a strong but subtle point by setWatch the Trailer soundtrack’s actual producer, ting Grace up against a roomful of young dude record execs to defend her continued relevance as a black female artist over forty. She doesn’t get much hitmaker Rodney “Darkchild” Jerkins, support in the room from her longtime manager Jack, played by Ice Cube, another David’s throwback soul (and Harrison’s smooth vocals) have the ring of music accomplished actor with inside knowledge of the music business. Cube wrote and rapped hip-hop’s most notoriously scathing diss of a music manager you might hear from an indie artist in the (“No Vaseline”), but he didn’t write this. His Jack Robertson, the only sort-of villain in the age of Drake and The Weeknd. Similarly, piece, doesn’t read as authentically as the Grace Davis character, and Cube, saddled with Grace Davis — celebrated here on magazine covers framed alongside her gold a bag of half-funny comebacks by Flora Greeson’s script, isn’t a great fit as the bad guy. For one thing, the hyper-territorial Jack lets Grace’s hard-working, yet sneaky, and platinum records — dresses, acts, and personal assistant Maggie, well-played by Dakota Johnson, get away with more than sounds like the revered diva she’s intendwhat seems credible, even in a Hollywood fairytale. Maggie gets away with every- ed to be, not an imitation of a legend, but a thing because The High Note primarily is her story of hustling a path from serving true original in her own right.
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The High Note is available on VOD starting Friday, May 29. A 48-hour rental is $19.99. Visit www.WatchTheHighNote.com. MAY 28, 2020 • METROWEEKLY.COM
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