REVIEW: The Piano Lesson [2024]

Rating: PG-13 | Runtime: 125 minutes
Release Date: November 8th, 2024 (USA)
Studio: Netflix
Director(s): Malcolm Washington
Writer(s): Virgil Williams & Malcolm Washington / August Wilson (play)

Ghost of the Yellow Dog pushed him.

Malcolm Washington’s adaptation (with Virgil Williams) of August Wilson’s play The Piano Lesson is a stirring and resonant ghost story. Centered on a family haunted by its past both in the sense of being descended from slaves and having committed their own crimes as free men too, it grapples with legacy from two opposed vantage points born from the same sorrow. On one side is Boy Willie (John David Washington) on a quest to build upon what his father, grandfather, etc. left him. On the other is Berniece’s (Danielle Deadwyler) wish to commemorate the struggle with the product of their pain.

Both siblings attempt to fulfill their desires through a piano left to them by their father. Well, it’s probably more accurate to call it a piano he died to acquire that was subsequently left to them as a result. To Boy Willie it’s an object imbued with value and thus ripe to be sold so he can buy a farm and own the land his ancestors worked. To Berniece it’s a symbol that literally and figuratively holds the story of who they are—adorned by carved images of her family and soaked with their blood. It holds the potential for life and the memory of death, and it sits in Uncle Doaker’s (Samuel L. Jackson) house unused because the ghosts it carries are better left locked inside. Or that’s what they thought.

Because now, days after the death of the man Boy Charles (Stephan James as Boy Willie and Berniece’s late father), Doaker, and their brother Wining Boy (Michael Potts) stole the piano from, it’s obvious that the ghosts connected to this instrument exist outside its case. Sutter (Jay Peterson), killed after inexplicably falling down his well like many others back where their family was first enslaved, has finally found his lost possession and appears eager to reclaim it. Is his presence a product of guilt or evil? Is it perhaps a product of fear and, if so, what are Boy Willie and Berniece afraid of? That the piano is a harbinger of death or that the blood spilled was necessary to breathe life into a future that holds the promise of more?

It’s a powerful question with a complex answer considering where they’ve all been and where they look to go. Boy Willie sees a return to that land as its steward as a means to exorcise the demons that loom over his shoulder. But he’s the only one. Doaker would never want to go back. Neither does Lymon (Ray Fisher), a gullible family friend who’s been helping Boy Willie chase his dream. They want to leave all that behind them and start fresh. To shake those demons loose and forget the hold they once had. Wining Boy and Berniece lie somewhere in the middle—yearning for something new despite seemingly never allowing themselves to take it.

What the audience therefore witnesses through this fight over the piano is a history lesson of their family and the ways in which they’ve blamed each other for their own mistakes. Doaker thinks that artifact is a curse, but knows Berniece won’t part with it. So, he doesn’t actively choose a side when Boy Willie demands to sell like Wining Boy does (he’s with Berniece). Doaker simply airs their story to Lymon as a means of educating us and reminding his niece and nephew. It’s ultimately their decision. He merely wants to ensure they don’t forget the trouble it’s been just as the ghost ensures that they also remember its value lies with more than just money.

That’s the part that got me. Yes, the familial drama and historical angle captivates, but the addition of this supernatural entity by way of the family’s fear to let go or move on takes it to another level. Because it only interrupts them or scares them when the prospect of giving the piano up arises. They say that “Sutter wants his property” back, but its presence reveals the opposite. It’s not therefore about Sutter or any external force of malice. It’s about them and the evil they manifest to protect themselves from doing the wrong thing. It makes sense too considering the piano’s story is about revenge. If Sutter wants it back, they should want to keep it more.

Not just keep it, though. Appreciate it. That’s where Avery (Corey Hawkins) comes in. Yes, he’s present as a symbol of new beginnings for Berniece, but also as a figure of God in the metaphorical sense. The joke is that he’s only decided to become a preacher so he’ll never have to “do real work,” so he’s just as fake on one side as the ghost is on the other. But, just as the latter shakes them into action when the prospect of moving the piano arises, so too does he with the prospect of keeping it. Berniece wants it to remain, but its horror has a hold on her that might push her to the same violence she denounces Boy Willie for.

The only choice then is to reclaim it for themselves. To realize the piano isn’t yet theirs. They must extricate it from the darkness of its origins by bringing it into the light of hope young Maretha (Skylar Aleece Smith) provides as their family’s next generation. Only then can they end its hold as an albatross of pain. Only then can Boy Willie and Berniece stop their feud and repair their family from the injuries America wrought upon them. I really like Fisher here, but it’s Washington and Deadwyler who take command from frame one. We must only pray that their passion doesn’t end up feeding the instrument more blood.