Oscar-nominated actor to direct, star in biopic about Alabama-born jazz legend Nat King Cole
Oscar-nominated actor Colman Domingo has his sights set on a biopic about Alabama jazz icon Nat King Cole.
Variety reports Domingo, who is up for an Academy Award for his leading role in “Rustin,” will star as the legendary singer in a movie musical from a script he co-wrote. The film will also be Domingo’s feature-directing debut.
“I’ve been working on it quietly for a few years,” Domingo told Variety during an episode of the publication’s Awards Circuit podcast. “It’s something I’m looking forward to putting together with some great partners.”
Interpretations of Cole seem to be projects close to Domingo’s heart. The “Ruffin” actor worked with Patricia McGregor to write “Lights Out: Nat ‘King’ Cole,” a play about the final broadcast of “The Nat King Cole Show.” The theatrical work, starring Dulé Hill as Nat King Cole and Daniel J. Watts as Sammy Davis Jr., premiered at the Geffen Playhouse in 2019.
Born in 1919, Montgomery native Nat King Cole was a singer, actor, and jazz pianist. Cole hosted “The Nat King Cole Show” from 1956 to 1957. The variety show, which ran on NBC, was the first nationally broadcast television show hosted by an African American.
Cole often drew criticism from civil rights activists for performing for all-white audiences when he toured in the South, and several social justice leaders called on the influential jazz icon to speak publicly about racial injustice. A turning point came in 1956 when Cole and the Ted Heath Orchestra took the stage at Birmingham’s Municipal Auditorium (now called the Boutwell Auditorium). The musicians were on their third song when club-wielding members of the Ku Klux Klan of the Confederacy rushed the stage. As the all-white audience of 4,000 watched, the 37-year-old Cole was knocked off his piano bench.
Read More: Nat King Cole was beaten on a Birmingham stage in 1956
Cole previously chose to remain disconnected from the civil rights movement. But after the attack, the lauded jazz singer started to become more active in the fight for racial equality. He joined a local chapter of the NAACP and participated in the 1963 March on Washington with a number of other musicians.
Cole, who died in 1965, received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1990. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2000. Cole has also received several accolades in his home state. He was inducted into the Alabama Music Hall of Fame in 1985 and the Alabama Jazz Hall of Fame in 1993. Cole is also honored in exhibits at the Alabama Jazz Hall of Fame museum, housed in Birmingham’s historic Carver Theatre.
Several of Colman Domingo’s roles center around figures who were either born in or have a connection to Alabama. In “Rustin,” Domingo portrays Bayard Rustin, a civil rights activist who spent years working in Selma and Birmingham. He plays Cutler in “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom,” the Netflix film about Alabama blues legend Ma Rainey. Domingo also won a Tony Award for his role as Mr. Bones in “The Scottsboro Boys,” the Broadway musical based on Alabama’s historic Scottsboro Boys trial.
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