Back when she was in drama class, Naomi Ackie used to wonder what it might be like to go to the premiere of her first movie. In this scenario, the movie in question was something a bit smaller than, say, Sony Pictures’ Whitney Houston biopic — with Ackie making her film breakout playing the icon herself.
But given that’s how the Brit is making her big break, the occasion called for an outfit worthy of Houston.
“I can’t ever have a first debut lead in a film again, especially in a film this big. So I was like, I want to go big and I want to go like me, my most confident self,” she says, of the decision to wear a crystal-covered Schiaparelli gown to the premiere.
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Ackie is taking on the role of Whitney Houston in the new movie “I Wanna Dance With Somebody,” about the rise to fame of the woman known as “the voice.” In the time that followed, she has shot Zoë Kravitz’s directorial debut “Pussy Island,” and Bong Joon-ho’s upcoming film “Mickey 17.”
It’s very much Ackie’s breakout moment.
During COVID-19, Ackie worked on an indie film and a musical and spent time in the English countryside, and was thankful simply to be working, she said. And then one day her agent called to say the studio had begun casting the Whitney Houston biopic.
“I can’t lie, when I first was even being asked for the audition, I was like, ‘What?’ I just never thought…we don’t look alike,” Ackie says, from the Park Lane Hotel in New York while in town for the film’s premiere. “And I was very comfortable in my role, at that time, of supporting actor, and still finding my way and wanting to do that, but not thinking that my first time would ever be something like this.”
She managed to remain calm during the nearly four months of auditioning, hearing her mom’s voice in her head telling her, “if it’s for you, it won’t pass you,” she said.
“And in a way I was kind of like, ‘Well, I don’t think this is for me.’ Not that I didn’t want it, but that I didn’t [think I would get it],” she says.
Ackie, at 30 years old, was too young to remember the tabloid craze around Houston’s life and instead only knew of her music. After landing the role, she dove into researching the singer’s life and came away from the experience feeling a deep connection to Houston and what she went through at the center of so much attention.
“It made me feel so much closer to her and so much more empathetic of people who have that much connection with everyone. And I think it’s a beautiful thing, but it’s also a lot for one person to bear,” she says. “The main thing is that we are very blessed to do this job. I really recognize that my passion and my hobby has become my job. But it’s really hard, then, to separate your life from your work. And I think even good things need to be regulated. I don’t know if that’s straightaway off of Whitney’s story, but realizing that a passion for something is so good, but good has to be balanced with content in normalness and making time for yourself in different ways where you’re not always sharing with people. I love my job so much and I’m so happy and lucky to be here, but I do know that it’s as important for me to forge a rich life aside from that.”
The film features Houston’s actual voice when she sings, which Ackie had to convincingly mimic with many studio sessions to make sure she matched each inhale at the right moment.
“I’m not a singer, but I had enough in me to know musically what was needed for each thing and how I needed to move,” she says. “So it was just me really singing my little heart out and praying to God that no one was too close to hear it.”
Ackie, who grew up in East London, got her interest in singing from her dad, who worked for transport in London and was always singing around the house. They share a love for the musical “In the Heights” and frequently sing the soundtrack when together.
“I got kind of obsessed from a very young age about musicals and costumes and acting. And I think [my parents] probably thought it was a phase and then it just wasn’t,” Ackie says. “It never went away.”
“Pussy Island,” which she shot for three months over the summer, was her first project post-Whitney. The project filmed at a resort in Mexico, where she, Channing Tatum, Kravitz and the cast would sip mezcal at the end of the night and hang out between takes, giving the whole thing a grown up summer camp-like feel.
“I’d probably drink more water if I was to do it again, but it was incredible,” she says. “I learned a lot, and I so enjoyed and so respect Zoë and the work that she’s making, the message she’s sending with this story.”
“Mickey 17,” which is Bong’s first film since “Parasite,” also stars Robert Pattinson, Toni Collette, Steven Yeun and Mark Ruffalo, and is set for release in 2024.
“I’m spoiled for riches at the moment,” Ackie says. “It’s like that humble brag or whatever. But I genuinely feel so lucky to be having these artistic experiences.”