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SCREENING

Lady Sings the Blues

Ongoing

Location: Bartos Screening Room

Dir. Sidney J. Furie. 1973, 144 mins. 35mm. With Diana Ross, Billy Dee Williams, Richard Pryor. In her big screen debut, Diana Ross plays jazz icon Billie Holiday in a performance that earned her an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress, as well as a Golden Globe Award for Most Promising Newcomer. Based on Holiday’s best-selling autobiography, the film charts her rise from a traumatic youth to a fledgling career, a fraught romance with her manager (Williams), eventual superstardom, and a derailing addiction. “One of the great performances of 1972. [Ross] doesn’t sing in her own style, and she never tries to imitate Holiday, but she sings somehow in the manner of Holiday. There is an uncanny echo, a suggestion, and yet the style is a tribute to Billie Holiday, not an impersonation.”—Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times

Tickets: $15 ($11 seniors and students / $9 youth (ages 3–17) / free for children under 3 and Museum members at the Film Lover and Kids Premium levels and above). Order online. (Members may contact [email protected] with questions regarding online reservations.)

Ticket purchase includes same-day admission to the Museum (see gallery hours). View the Museum’s ticketing policy here. For more information on membership and to join online, visit our membership page.

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