Whitney Houston

Screenwriter Anthony McCarten reveals conversations he had with Whitney Houston's friends and family while writing I Wanna Dance With Somebody.

As portrayed in the biopic, it is the one friendship of Houston’s that holds steady throughout her staggering success and struggles. There is one occasion in the film for which Houston refuses to dress up in pop-star drag, though: her iconic 1991 performance of “The Star-Spangled Banner” at the Super Bowl. “But he broke that promise.…He became instrumental when she was in trouble, telling her to go to rehab. He was there when she was a teenager, and he was there delivering the eulogy when she passed. Davis had singlehandedly shaped Houston’s career—which surpassed the Beatles’ record with [seven consecutive](https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2012/06/whitney-houston-death-bathtub-drugs-rehab) number one hits and exceeded sales of more than 200 million records. [tragic death](https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2012/06/whitney-houston-death-bathtub-drugs-rehab), an accidental drowning with atherosclerotic heart disease and cocaine use as contributing factors, the renowned music producer met with Oscar-nominated screenwriter Anthony McCarten (The Theory of Everything, Darkest Hour, The Two Popes), who had recently tackled Queen frontman Freddie Mercury’s life story in Bohemian Rhapsody.

NPR's A Martinez speaks with British actor Naomi Ackie about playing Whitney Houston in the new film: I Wanna Dance with Somebody.

Actress Nafessa Williams plays Robyn Crawford in the highly-anticipated new biopic "Whitney Houston: I Wanna Dance With Somebody."

"At the core of it, they just really loved and adored each other and were very, very loyal to each other. "At the most purest level, they were friends," says Williams of Houston and Crawford. "Black Lightning" star Nafessa Williams plays Crawford in the film.

This film from Kasi Lemmons is a jukebox retelling of Whitney Houston's parabola from sweatshirts to sequins.

Houston’s defiance is the movie’s attempt to answer the great mystery of her career: why she deliberately damaged her voice through smoking and hard drugs. No one could sing like Whitney Houston, and Kasi Lemmons, the director of the biopic “Whitney Houston: I Wanna Dance With Somebody,” only rarely asks her lead, Naomi Ackie, to try. (Stanley Tucci plays her friendly, Fagin-with-a-combover Clive Davis of Arista Records, who also produced this film.) At Houston’s final “Oprah” performance, recreated here, she belts an earnest ballad called, “I Didn’t Know My Own Strength.” We’ve heard Houston’s rendition of “I Will Always Love You” countless times, and Lemmons bets, correctly, that the beloved hit will still seize us by the heart during the rather forthright montage she pairs with it, images of Houston marrying Brown, birthing her daughter Bobbi Kristina and honoring Nelson Mandela underneath a sky filled with fireworks. Houston didn’t write her own material; she just sang like she did, courtesy of Cissy’s fastidious coaching. Ackie doesn’t much resemble the superstar, although her carriage is correct: eyes closed, head flung back, arms pushing away the air as if to make room for that mezzo-soprano.

'I Wanna Dance With Somebody' is part of a broader effort to reframe Houston's legacy in the years after her death at 48.

“I was there that night, and it was a real shock to her,” says Kenny “Babyface” Edmonds, the influential R&B singer and producer. “Whitney opened the door for everybody,” says Babyface, be it Mariah Carey and Celine Dion in the ’90s or Ariana Grande and Demi Lovato in the 2010s. Like many biopics, “I Wanna Dance With Somebody” speeds through the final chapters of its subject’s life. Narada Michael Walden, who co-wrote and produced “How Will I Know” and worked closely with Houston on her 1987 sophomore LP, says Cissy Houston brought Whitney along as a child to Cissy’s recording sessions as a backup vocalist for the likes of Franklin and Presley. “I used to listen to Whitney sing in the basement of our home in East Orange,” Gary Houston tells The Times. “When I first watched the scene, they had some fake demo they’d gotten from a website or something,” says Jerkins, whose job on the film included fact-checking the musical elements. “To have her by the mic for the first time in our studio in Atlanta, I was like, ‘This is Whitney f— Houston, and she sounds even better than I imagined,’” Babyface says. “I Wanna Dance With Somebody” traces Houston’s talent back to her mother, the gospel and pop singer Cissy Houston, who trained Whitney and her older brother Gary to perform in church in their native New Jersey. “He was jumping around with her on the playback. “Her authentic voice is what allows fans to relive some of the most incredible performances in history,” Jerkins says. “There was never really a question of using a voice other than Whitney’s,” says Davis, a producer on the film along with Houston’s sister-in-law, Pat Houston, who oversees the singer’s estate. 1 singles on Billboard’s Hot 100; “I Will Always Love You,” her smash interpretation of Dolly Parton’s stately ballad from “The Bodyguard,” is widely thought to be the bestselling single of all time by a female artist.

Whitney Houston's "I Wanna Dance With Somebody" biopic clumsily treks through the singer's rise and fall, according to critics.

From New Jersey choir girl to one of the best-selling and most awarded recording artists of all time, audiences are taken on an inspirational, poignant — and so emotional — journey through Houston’s trailblazing life and career, with show-stopping performances and a soundtrack of the icon’s most beloved hits as you’ve never heard them before. Directed by Kasi Lemmons, written by Academy Award nominee Anthony McCarten, produced by legendary music executive Clive Davis, and starring BAFTA Award winner Naomi Ackie, the film is a no-holds-barred portrait of the complex and multifaceted woman behind The Voice. “‘I Wanna Dance With Somebody’ is a powerful and triumphant celebration of the incomparable Whitney Houston. Joining her are Ashton Sanders (”Moonlight”) as Bobby Brown, the singer’s ex-husband, Stanley Tucci as legendary record company mogul Clive Davis, and “Law And Order: Special Victims Unit” alum Tamara Tunie, who portrays Houston’s mother, Cissy Houston. [Vanity Fair movie critic Richard Lawson](https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2022/12/i-wanna-dance-with-somebody-review). CLEVELAND, Ohio-- Whitney Houston’s “I Wanna Dance With Somebody” biopic offers a beautiful melody of her greatest hits but falls flat when trekking through the singer’s rise and her later fall from grace as “America’s Sweetheart,” critics say.

Whitney Houston's voice was one of a kind and the creative team behind a new big-budget biopic of the singer have been forced to agree.

“I Wanna Dance With Somebody,” a Sony Pictures release exclusively in theaters Dec. Lemmons ("Harriet") also uses a recurring image of a faucet dripping, a graceless way of foreshadowing her death. “I Wanna Dance With Somebody” is more like a hyped-up “Behind the Music” episode set to Houston's greatest hits album. Costume designer Charlese Antoinette Jones has joyously remade key looks, from Houston's hair bow and arm warmers to the stunning wedding dress with beaded and sequined cloche hat. McCarten frames the climax of Houston's life at the 1994 American Music Awards, where she won eight awards and performed a medley of songs. McCarten clearly has impressed producers with an ability to tell the stories of modern icons but with Houston the hook is, well, business pressure.

Spanning Whitney Houston's signing with Arista Records in 1983 through her death in February 2012, the authorized musical biopic “Whitney Houston: I Wanna ...

That aside, Lemmons and her cast succeed in evoking the memory of a legend gone too soon. Tucci and Ackie are convincing as caring collaborators, and Lemmons lets them create an intimacy that’s lacking in most of the film. [Bohemian Rhapsody](https://www.cambridgeday.com/2018/11/03/bohemian-rhapsody-freddie-mercury-deserved-better-then-few-minutes-of-magic/)” (2018) screenwriter Anthony McCarten deserves kudos for the logistical accomplishment of buying the rights to Houston’s life and music, but should have done more than pen a CliffsNotes version of the icon’s life. As Robyn, Williams – who played the first black lesbian superhero in the series “Black Lightning” – never creates the impression of being controlling or minimizing, as has been alleged. McCarten also learned from his mistakes in depicting Freddie Mercury by not pathologizing Houston’s bisexuality and struggle with substance addiction and exploitive men. Mixing archival footage with reenactments of stadium concerts, studio recordings, glimpses of breathless fans in the crowd and Houston’s home life, Lemmons maintains momentum while retaining a semblance of a coherent story.

Stanley Tucci plays a subdued and concerned Clive Davis — the record executive helped produce the film and comes off like a prince — and Nafessa Williams is ...

“I Wanna Dance With Somebody” is more like a hyped-up “Behind the Music” episode set to Houston’s greatest hits album. Lemmons (“Harriet”) also uses a recurring image of a faucet dripping, a graceless way of foreshadowing her death. “I Wanna Dance With Somebody,” a Sony Pictures release exclusively in theaters Dec. 23, is rated PG-13 for “strong drug content, some strong language, suggestive references and smoking.” Running time: 146 minutes. Costume designer Charlese Antoinette Jones has joyously remade key looks, from Houston’s hair bow and arm warmers to the stunning wedding dress with beaded and sequined cloche hat. But the solution would have been choosing between focusing on Houston’s story or making a documentary that features her singing.

An unvarnished, old-school biopic looks at the rise and fall of the pop icon. image Naomi AckiePhoto: Emily Aragones ...

Whitney, who is more focused on pursuing a same-sex love affair with Robyn Crawford (Nafessa Williams) than she is on Cissy’s admonishments about technique, casually sings backup to her mother in a nightclub. Proceeding almost entirely in chronological order (with the exception of a justly celebrated 1994 appearance on the American Music Awards, which bookends the film), the biopic begins in early ’80s New Jersey, when Whitney (played with emotional potency by Naomi Ackie, who lip-syncs the magnificent vocals) is an impatient teen who chafes when her mother, Cissy (Tamara Tunie), a professional singer and a mainstay in her gospel chorus, tries to train her in the family craft. Whitney Houston was, like Elvis Presley, interesting enough by herself, and director Kasi Lemmons does justice to her with a straightforward consideration of her tragic arc.

Whitney Houston's vocal prowess is so formidable that my audience in my screening repeatedly cheered as the chanteuse demonstrated how diverse genres and ...

The new Roku movie "Weird: The Al Yankovic Story" feels more authentic and visceral in comparison. Despite the involvement of Houston's family and Arista Records founder Clive Davis, who mentored her career, "Whitney Houston" plays as if it were cut and pasted from the Wikipedia entry on her. For example, Houston effortlessly performed "The Star-Spangled Banner," making the rangy melody and the 19th-century words seem fresh.

Clive Davis and Maureen Crowe, music supervisor for 'The Bodyguard,' recount that soundtrack's making, as recreated in 'I Wanna Dance With Somebody.'

“But as a student of film and a man on the board of Columbia Pictures, your film needs Whitney to soar musically. “David was thrilled with the vocal, and sent me the rough mix before its instrumentation. Davis goes on to say that it was Costner who suggested to the executive music team (“namely Whitney, David Foster and myself”) that Dolly Parton’s “I Will Always Love You” was the song that would be used as the film’s most climactic song. “All three of us responded affirmatively: ‘I Will Always Love You,’ with a different arrangement, would be perfect for that scene.” He called me back to tell me that he had yelled at Clive and couldn’t believe that he was using a board mix to hand in to the film’s producers. What was needed, and fast, was a song that would work in an earlier date scene between the bodyguard and superstar – “something in Kevin’s character’s world” – as well as at film’s end as a song to be sung back to him in gratitude for saving her and her child’s life. “I Will Always Love You,” the first single from “The Bodyguard,” became the biggest-selling single by a female artist at the time with over 20 million copies sold, and it stayed at No. Davis laughs when recalling his having written a letter to “Bodyguard” director Mick Jackson and Costner, telling them that they “would probably expect that the head of a record label would complain about the lack of music in your film,” he says. saw how ‘Boomerang’ buried all the songs that he and Babyface had made, he was happy to be a part of ‘The Bodyguard.'” “’I Will Always Love You’ is a real songwriter’s song,” says Crowe of the Dolly Parton hit, first released in 1974. “Kevin, at that time, was a multiple Oscar winner and an exceptional filmmaker,” notes Crowe, pointing out that his “Dances with Wolves” had cleaned up at the 63rd Academy Awards, winning seven Oscars, including best picture and best director for its star. “Whitney really trusted Kevin that her first major film experience would be a great one, that she could rely on him for ‘The Bodyguard’ to be a success, and that the story worked,” says Crowe.

Whitney Houston's vocal prowess is so formidable that my audience in my screening repeatedly cheered as the chanteuse demonstrated how diverse genres and ...

Clive Davis and Whitney Houston at Davis' Pre-Grammy Party in Los Angeles in. The song-selection process is depicted in abbreviated form in “I Wanna Dance with ...

[Kevin Costner](https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/people/2019/06/22/kevin-costner-drops-whitney-houston-bombshell-bodyguard-poster/1535534001/), Houston’s co-star in “The Bodyguard,” unearthed the Dolly Parton twanger – though the version he played Houston was Linda Ronstadt’s 1975 cover – and suggested it for the film. [for “The Bodyguard” ](https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/people/2019/06/22/kevin-costner-drops-whitney-houston-bombshell-bodyguard-poster/1535534001/)was written by L.A. There is a reason Davis says she is, “the best singer of her generation." One of the hallmarks of the song – its stunning a capella intro – was discouraged by the record label, but Costner and Houston insisted it remain. Though stocked with ’80s touchstones – a gurgling sax solo, a squiggly guitar break – the song is deeper than its Lite-Brite video conveys as Houston allows us to feel her shyness and uncertainty. In the “I Wanna Dance with Somebody” film, Davis first hears Houston sing with her mother, Cissy, at New York’s Sweetwater Club. Released as a single only in Europe and Japan, the Michael Masser/Jeffrey Osborne-penned paean with its orchestral swells and swaying chorus spotlights Houston’s vulnerability as she pines for the past. The sentiment is simple enough: “I get so emotional baby/every time I think of you/ain’t it shocking what love can do.” On her sixth consecutive No. “I would narrow the list down to 20 songs before I played any for her, and she and I would narrow those down to the 10 finalists.” When Houston dramatically unfurls the “don’t make me close one more door” lyric, it’s every bit as effective as Jennifer Holliday belting “And I Am Telling You I’m Not Going.” “Whitney had not done any studio albums for (nearly) eight years,” Davis says. At the time, apt comparisons were made to Janet Jackson’s similarly [snarling “Black Cat.”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qH-rPt1ftSo)

'I Wanna Dance With Somebody' perfectly captures Whitney Houston's exuberant contradictions, and the joy she took and gave in performing.

(Davis is one of the movie’s producers.) But [fields the criticism](https://www.gawker.com/remember-when-whitney-houston-got-booed-for-being-too-w-1660783143) that part of her audience has deemed her “not Black enough.” In one of the movie’s most intense scenes, she rushes to the side of her hospitalized father where, even as he’s gasping for breath, he hisses through his teeth that she had better [pay back the money he believes she owes him](https://www.mtv.com/news/v5j6c1/whitney-houston-sued-for-100-million-by-dads-company). The tragedy of Whitney Houston has so many tiers: it’s a classic story about show-biz exhaustion, about being bilked by people who should be working in your best interest, about turning to drugs when you need to unwind after a show or rev up before one. She hears one song—it happens to be [“How Will I Know?”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m3-hY-hlhBg)—and brightens immediately; he gently counters that he’s not sure it has a hook. “We can go to hell for this kind of shit,” she tells Robyn, waving her arms at the apartment the two share, a place where a fluffy cat sleeps on their bed, where they have coffee together in the morning. Is that an idealized version of the relationship between a superstar producer and his superstar? But of the non-docs, at least, [Kasi Lemmons](https://time.com/5714766/harriet-movie-review/)’ Whitney Houston: I Wanna Dance with Somebody—starring English actress Naomi Ackie—may come closest to capturing Houston’s exuberant contradictions, and the joy she both took and gave in performing. We’ve already seen that she’s at least two people in one: a forthright young woman who knows what she wants, and a woman who gives too much away, to the people around her and maybe even to her audience. When she was alive, we knew about her extraordinary vocal range, and how [electrifying a performer](https://time.com/5784149/whitney-houston-wedding/) she was. Young Whitney makes her TV debut on the Merv Griffin show—her singing is less a full-on display of what she can do and more of an embrace, as if she yearned to take the whole world in at once. [Whitney Houston](https://time.com/4903745/whitney-houston-documentary-can-i-be-me/) didn’t click until she was gone. Her [death in 201](https://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,2106998,00.html)2, after a drug-related drowning accident, was mournful but not particularly surprising.

The legendary producer talks about his relationship with the late superstar, and what he thinks of Naomi Ackie's portrayal in I Wanna Dance With Somebody.

I never knew that she, being as young as she was, would appreciate the historic significance of it, so I did sit with her one day and I said, “I know you know the rarity of a number one record, but I don’t know if you know the rarity of seven consecutive number one records. What I want to know, Whitney, is are you pinching yourself?” That phrase—“Are you pinching yourself?”—became byplay with us. Her first audition [for me] when she unexpectedly sang “The Greatest Love of All.” I had commissioned that song eight years earlier for The Greatest, about the life of Muhammad Ali. I never got the feeling that he was interviewing me. For Davis, getting I Wanna Dance into the world is something of a relief, especially after his personal distaste for a past “unsatisfying” documentary about Houston that he felt didn’t accurately tell her story. “It really celebrates the once-in-a-lifetime artist that Whitney was.”

Naomi Ackie plays Whitney Houston in Kasi Lemmons' new biopic about the late megastar. Emily Aragones/CTMG/Sony Pictures. What the Whitney Houston ...

When we talk about the lineage from which she comes, it can seem like she’s the natural beneficiary of the grooming of Cissy Houston, the family connection to Dionne Warwick, the mentorship of Aretha Franklin and Chaka Khan, whom Whitney knew through her mother. 2012’s “Sparkle” is a great example of that. I mean that literally, in the sense of becoming more of a producer on the records. There are a number of movements that you can point to that I think have collectively generated a cultural energy around revisiting women who were maligned, undermined and underestimated. 1997’s “Cinderella” is a great example of that. I think that there’s more general interest in “unruly women,” in trying to recover them, recuperate them, restore their complexity. I’m saying that she became freer in expressing it, as she acquired more power over her sound and image. On the third album cover, she’s in a seemingly urban environment. In her book, Robyn Crawford talks about how some people didn’t like the cover image Whitney preferred for her first record (1985) because it looked “too Black.” [How Will I Know](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m3-hY-hlhBg&ab_channel=whitneyhoustonVEVO)” to the ultimate patriot in the national anthem. The release of Lemmons’ film, which transports viewers to the world that begat the singer beloved as The Voice, offers us a chance to revisit [her complex life and unmatched legacy](https://www.cnn.com/2022/02/11/entertainment/whitney-houston-gay-icon-10-years-later/index.html) with fresh eyes. It can be challenging to take in the multi-dimensionality of her as a person.

Whitney Houston and Robyn Crawford had a complex, beautiful and deep relationship that lasted over 20 years. Crawford has been vocal about the love she had ...

[He said](https://www.usmagazine.com/celebrity-news/news/bobby-brown-whitney-houston-had-same-sex-romance-with-robyn-crawford-w209306/) she “absolutely” would have been bothered by having a gay daughter and would not have approved of it. [Crawford has described](https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-50432110) their relationship by saying, “People pull it out as a relationship—but we met and we clicked and we became friends. [Whitney Houston and Robyn Crawford](https://www.insider.com/whitney-houston-best-friend-robyn-crawford-physical-sexual-relationship-2019-11) first met at an East Orange summer camp in the summer of 1980 when Houston was 16 and Crawford was 19. [Robyn Crawford revealed](https://www.theguardian.com/music/2019/nov/16/friendship-intimate-on-all-levels-whitney-houston-robyn-crawford-addiction-fame-secrecy) in her 2019 book A Song for You: My Life with Whitney Houston that not only were the two best friends for decades, as was known, but they had a romantic and sexual aspect to their relationship at times. [Whitney Houston: I Wanna Dance With Somebody](https://parade.com/movies/i-wanna-dance-with-somebody-movie) explores the relationship between [Whitney Houston](https://parade.com/tag/whitney-houston) and [Robyn Crawford](https://parade.com/949204/alexandra-hurtado/whitney-houston-robyn-crawford-today-show/) onscreen for the first time with the permission of the late singer's estate. [Bobby Brown has confirmed](https://www.usmagazine.com/celebrity-news/news/bobby-brown-whitney-houston-had-same-sex-romance-with-robyn-crawford-w209306/) that Whitney Houston had a secret same-sex relationship with Robyn Crawford. [She described these jobs](https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-50432110), “Manning the desk at the tennis club wasn't for me, you know? Crawford was a guiding force in Houston’s career as well as the maid of honor at Houston and Bobby Brown’s wedding. In her 2019 book A Song for You: My Life with Whitney Houston, Crawford revealed that their relationship also had a romantic and sexual component, beginning when they first met in the summer of 1980 when the two were teenagers. However, she claims that [Houston ended that aspect](https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-50432110) of their relationship two years later out of fear of the negative impact it could have on both their lives, as she had just signed a record deal. Crawford, Houston’s longtime friend and onetime secret [romantic](https://parade.com/936221/marynliles/romantic-love-quotes/) partner, has been vocal about her complicated and loving relationship with the late superstar. Crawford was even the maid of honor at Houston’s wedding to Bobby Brown.

I Wanna Dance with Somebody lacks the ingredients of what made Houston a force that permanently altered every person who truly heard her.

Who was Houston as a mother, as a businesswoman, and as the leader of her career? Her marriage to Brown lacks a visible arc; the role that Crawford played in Houston's life after Brown entered is never discussed (though Williams pulls some laughs through her energetic verve); and Cicely and John serve little purpose (Peters makes some very odd, grating choices). Houston eventually signs with the steadfast Clive Davis, takes advice from her parents Cicely and the selfish patriarch [John Houston](/cast-and-crew/john-houston) ( [Clarke Peters](/cast-and-crew/clarke-peters)) to tone down her butch image in lieu of becoming America's princess. Some of her dissonant decisions are unintentionally comedic in an "It's so bad, it's entertaining" way, like when Houston’s father threatens his daughter with litigation from his hospital bed—the next cut is to his funeral. Instead, the film hops and skips through the highlights of Houston's career: making the music video for "How Will I Know," choosing the demo tape of the titular "I Wanna Dance with Somebody" from Davis' pile of cassettes, and performing "The Star-Spangled Banner" at Super Bowl XXV. When the latter sees the A&R man taking his seat, she fakes losing her voice, clearing the way for her daughter to sing "The Greatest Love of All."

Let's take a look at the true story of “the most anticipated music interview of the decade,” according to Oprah Winfrey herself.

In the two-part interview, which runs a little more than an hour, Winfrey warmly but firmly drills down on Houston’s marriage with Brown. “It was on this stage that it all happened for me,” Houston recalled, her voice deep and raspy. “I was this little, tiny girl with this big voice.” The voice, Winfrey reminds her. For a quarter of a century, The Oprah Winfrey Show was one of the most influential forces in pop culture. The show drew high ratings but was canceled after one season; Houston and Brown later divorced in 2007. By then, Brown had been in and out of jail and was

Interviews with the director, writer and stars of the film, which makes full use of Houston's musical catalog.

Because she knew her voice was there and she knew that she had free range and had the right to explore all realms of music. [Bratton](https://www.nj.com/entertainment/2022/11/how-njs-elegance-bratton-of-the-inspection-became-a-director-to-watch.html?outputType=amp), who grew up in Phillipsburg, is the director of “ [The Inspection](https://www.nj.com/entertainment/2022/11/how-njs-elegance-bratton-of-the-inspection-became-a-director-to-watch.html?outputType=amp),” an A24 film released in November. “I think it’s important for people who are fans of hers who are in the LGBTQ community, I’m sure there’s going to be some relatability there and some moments of feeling seen,” she says. When you’re not able to be your authentic self, the effects of that, as you can see and imagine, (are) very detrimental.” “Making a movie and trying to tell Whitney’s story without her music is like trying to tell a joke without a punchline,” says McCarten, a producer of the film alongside Lemmons and Ackie. To make Houston’s death the final word on the artist “obscures her musical genius,” he says, dimming the singular power of a voice that with her first two albums claimed the top spot on the Billboard 200 and powered seven consecutive No. “There’s an essence that Whitney had that Naomi really captures in this tremendous stage presence, but also in just who she is as a woman,” Lemmons says. (It helped that her go-to karaoke song was “I Wanna Dance With Somebody.”) And significantly, the people in her life responded to her performance as Whitney, the people that knew Whitney.” “She wasn’t just trying to get out of it, she wasn’t just trying to escape reality. She was trying to find reality, she was trying to find a home. I wanted to just clear the slate, and say, ‘Let’s tell the story of an artist who was on a journey’ ...

Clive Davis confirmed Whitney Houston's teenage affair with assistant Robyn Crawford in a new interview with "Extra" promoting the singer's new biopic.

“She and I were pretty in sync on almost every issue. We just lived our lives, and I hoped it could go on that way forever,” she said. She married Brown in 1992.