Review: 'The Piano Lesson' is a mixed bag

If good intentions were all, this screen version of "The Piano Lesson" would earn high marks. But wishing doesn't make it so. And this muddled film adaptation of the Pulitzer prize-winning play by August Wilson, now in theaters in advance of its Netflix debut on Nov. 22, is a mixed bag.

It's the third movie to be adapted from Wilson's 10-play series, collectively called "The Pittsburgh Cycle," about the systemic and historical exploitation of Black Americans through each decade of the 20th century.

The playwright died in 2005, but his work will live on, especially if Denzel Washington has anything to say about it. After starring in and directing 2016's "Fences" and shepherding 2020's "Ma Rainey's Black Bottom" to the screen, the Oscar-winning star is producing "The Piano Lesson" as a prime motivator in what might be called a Washington family mission statement.

"The greatest part of what's left of my career," said Washington -- who will turn 70 in December -- "is making sure August is taken care of."

That's a laudable commitment with some built-in traps. No Wilson film adaptation to date has been able to totally break free of its stage roots. "Fences" did it best, winning four Oscar nominations, including best picture, best adapted screenplay for Wilson, and best actor for Washington, with his co-star Viola Davis taking the prize for best supporting actress.

"The Piano Lesson," starring Denzel Washington's son John David Washington and directed by younger son Malcolm Washington from a script he wrote with Virgil Williams ("Mudbound"), is definitely a family affair. Denzel Washington's daughter Katia Washington is a co-producer, and the film is dedicated to their mother Pauletta Washington, who did not raise any nepo babies. Talent is evident everywhere.

The director starts with something rarely seen onstage -- an explosion of Fourth of July fireworks, circa 1911. As the white Sutter family gathers on their Mississippi plantation to watch the show, three Black men are in the house in the cumbersome process of stealing a piano.

Not just any piano. This one is decorated with designs carved by an enslaved ancestor. A quick cut jumps us to 1936 Pittsburgh, where the piano sits in the home of Doaker Charles (the great Samuel L. Jackson), who shares it with his niece Berniece (Danielle Deadwyler) and her daughter, Maretha (Skylar Smith).

What follows is the blunt intrusion of Doaker's nephew, Boy Willie (John David Washington), with his shy friend Lymon (Ray Fisher, terrific), who is busting to sell the piano to buy a piece of the old Sutter place as an act of reclamation.

Berniece isn't having it, seeing the piano as a legacy heirloom of terror that must never be forgotten. No spoilers except to say that Deadwyler is magnificent as she uses the camera to catch every nuance of feeling in Berniece. While the male actors, Fisher excepted, rely on surface pyrotechnics, the luminous Deadwyler gives Berniece a vivid inner life. Oscar snubbed her as the grieving mother in 2023's "Till." Please academy: Don't make that mistake again.

It's the attempt to free the film from its theatrical setting that sends it sideways, putting Wilson's poetic dialogue at odds with the director's attempt to trick things up with unnecessary action and flashbacks that dilute the impact of Jackson (who won a Tony nomination for the 2022 Broadway revival) in favor of a too-literal manifestation of a slaveowner's ghost.

The horror element works far better as implication, a sudden glint in Berniece's eyes speaks volumes about Black trauma and loss. Don't get me wrong, the film has moments of fiery ambivalence, as when the men sing a work song with an exuberance that belies their servitude. But the tonal imbalance keeps throwing the film off course.

Props are due the Washington family for preserving the work of a master. But "The Piano Lesson" onscreen feels caught between the conflicting impulses to respect the enduring art of Wilson and reimagine his words in cinematic terms. They're not there yet. But the Washingtons aren't going to quit on their aspirations any time soon. And that's worth cheering.