By Travis Johnson
Well, this is awkward. Miles Ahead, the impressionistic biopic of jazz legend, Miles Davis – directed by and starring Don Cheadle – is an enthralling look at the life and work of one of the most striking, controversial and influential figures in 20th century music. Given how packed with drama Davis’ life was – think drugs, booze, women, guns – a film biography of him strikes us as a no-brainer, but apparently it was missing one crucial ingredient – a white guy, namely Ewan McGregor. In a recent interview, Cheadle praised his Miles Ahead co-star’s acting chops, but noted “…the vicissitudes and the reality of what the film industry is, it was necessary for the financing to have a white actor in the film as well. That’s the reality of the business. The movie was seen as niche, it was seen as jazz – everything that made people feel it was a narrow focus, and that there would be an inability to sell it overseas. These stories we know – to put a white actor’s face on the poster. All these things were the mythology that we were told that we were coming up against while we were trying to make this movie.” Needs must when the devil drives, we guess, but is anyone else disappointed by the perception that white faces are still needed to draw audiences to black stories?
Miles Ahead is released in cinemas on June 16.
