“OWN Spotlight: Viola Davis” Premieres Friday, April 16 on OWN @ 10PM

Advanced clips of Oprah Winfrey’s conversation with Academy Award-winning Actress Viola Davis on her record-breaking performance in ‘Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom‘

OWN announced today “OWN Spotlight: Viola Davis” to air Friday, April 16 at 10PM ET/PT on OWN. Continuing conversations surrounding issues impacting Black lives, Oprah talks to Oscar, Emmy and Tony Award-Winning actress Viola Davis about her role as fearless blues singer Ma Rainey in “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom,” available on Netflix now. In the film, tensions and temperatures rise at a Chicago music studio in 1927 when fiery blues singer Ma Rainey joins her band for a recording session.

Oprah talks to Viola Davis, the most nominated Black actress in Oscar history, about her new film “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom.” In yet another critically acclaimed performance that led to an Oscar nomination for Best Actress, Davis inhabits “the Mother of the Blues” in an adaptation of an August Wilson play. Davis reveals what Ma’s struggle says about today’s America and what it taught her about harnessing her own powers as a Black woman. She also shares her thoughts on working with the late Chadwick Boseman on his final film.

“OWN Spotlight: Viola Davis” will be available on the WatchOWN app, in addition to being available on discovery+ starting Saturday April 17 through the end of the month, as well as on the “Super Soul” podcast line-up starting April 19. “OWN Spotlight: Viola Davis” is produced by OWN. The executive producers are Oprah Winfrey and Tara Montgomery.