Friday, Jan. 26, 2024 at 8 p.m. on KPBS 2 / Stream now with KPBS Passport!
From “First Time Ever I Saw Your Face” to “Killing Me Softly” and beyond, Roberta Flack gave voice to a global soundtrack of beauty and pain, love and anguish, hope and struggle. AMERICAN MASTERS "Roberta Flack" illuminates where reality, memory and imagination mix to present music icon Roberta Flack, a brilliant artist who transformed popular culture, in her own words.
With exclusive access to Flack’s archives of film, performances, interviews, home movies, photos, hit songs and unreleased music, the film documents how Flack’s musical virtuosity was inseparable from her lifelong commitment to civil rights.
AMERICAN MASTERS provides an intimate look into Flack’s artistry, life and triumphs over racism and sexism within and outside of the recording industry. Flack’s story is illuminated through interviews with:
- Reverend Jesse Jackson (political activist and minister)
- Clint Eastwood (actor, director and producer)
- Yoko Ono (multimedia artist, singer-songwriter, activist)
- Angela Davis (political activist)
- Eugene McDaniels (singer-songwriter)
- Joel Dorn (producer)
- Peabo Bryson (singer-songwriter)
- Valerie Simpson (songwriter, producer and performer)
- Les McCann (musician)
- Sean Lennon (musician)
- Jason King (music scholar, musician and author)
- Ann Powers (music critic, author) and more
In addition to Flack’s timeless music, the film also features an original score from award-winning musician Martin Perna of Antibalas (“Fela!: The Musical”).
A piano prodigy from an early age, Flack began studying classical piano at age 9 and was awarded a full music scholarship to Howard University at the age of 15. In 1968, moonlighting from her job as a music teacher with a regular gig at a Washington, D.C., nightclub, her singular talent caught the eye of jazz great Les McCann, who arranged an audition for Flack with Atlantic Records, which led to the recording of her debut album, "First Take."
“First Time I Ever Saw Your Face,” a song from "First Take," was personally selected by Clint Eastwood for his directorial debut "Play Misty for Me," and it would win Flack a Grammy Award. The following year, she won a Grammy for “Killing Me Softly,” becoming the first artist to win the Grammy Award for Record of the Year in two consecutive years.
Throughout her extraordinary career, Flack established hit-making mentorships with Donny Hathaway, Luther Vandross and Peabo Bryson. Flack’s indelible career has spanned decades and produced countless hit songs, including “Feel Like Makin’ Love” and “The Closer I Get to You.”
The film chronicles how, throughout her pioneering career, Flack used her powerful platform to sing about the Black experience in America. She battled opinions of her mixed-race marriage, confronted blatant racism within the recording industry and created space for Black women to produce their own music. She released her latest project, "Running," at age 80 in 2018, and was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award at the 2020 Grammy Awards.
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Credits:
A production of La Lutta Productions in association with American Masters Pictures. Produced, directed and written by Antonino D’Ambrosio (Frank Serpico, Johnny Cash’s Bitter Tears Revisited). George Sampas, Charlie Cohen, and Andrew Herwitz are executive producers. Mike Tyner, Yrthya Dinzey-Flores, and Axel Caballero are producers. Michael Kantor is executive producer for AMERICAN MASTERS.
