John David Washington Struggles with a Painful Past

John David Washington and his sister, played by Danielle Deadwyler, fight over a prized piano that tears their family apart in the Netflix trailer (below). The piano lessonwhich was published on Wednesday.

“You feel that? This is your family. This is your blood,” David Washington, as Boy Willie, tells a young woman (Skylar Smith) from the Charles family at one point in the trailer, as his hand runs over a piano decorated with the faces of family members carved by an enslaved ancestor.

The 130-year-old piano pits Boy Willie against his sister Berniece, played by Deadwyler, as he considers selling the heirloom to build a family fortune, while his sister wants to hold on to the only vestige of their family legacy.

In the middle, their uncle, played by Samuel L. Jackson, tries to mediate in a family struggling to secure a future by owning a plot of land his slave ancestors worked to preserve a past some want to forget. The piano lesson is directed and co-written by Malcolm Washington in his feature directorial debut, while his father, Denzel Washington, produces with Todd Black.

Malcolm Washington said in a director’s statement that his film depicts an eternal conflict between African-American families: “Boy Willie’s plight is very much my own, as I share Berniece’s sensibility and understanding of the gravity of inheritance. Like Berniece and Boy Willie, part of my goal is to honor the lives and legacies of my parents and our ancestors. I too come from a long line of women and men, some born into slavery and then freed from it, and my life is possible because of the decisions, sacrifices, and actions of each of them; it is paramount for me to do something meaningful with it. In Boy Willie’s words, ‘I’m supposed to build on what they left me.'”

The piano lessonco-written by Virgil Williams, will be released in select theaters on November 8, before streaming on Netflix starting November 22. Jackson and David Washington reprise their roles from an earlier Broadway revival starring Danielle Brooks.

The cast includes Ray Fisher, Michael Potts, Erykah Badu, Jerrika Hinton, Gail Bean and Corey Hawkins.