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Nina must be turning over in her grave. This casting is a travesty. Xeon mentioned award winner Viola Davis, the star of "How to Get Away with Murder" as being the ideal choice for this role. I agree. Zoe is too tall and wiry. I don't know whether Viola can sing but she could've lip synched to Nina's actual recordings, and just vamped for random snippets of her songs. Nina's voice is not that hard to duplicate because playing the piano was her primary talent. She was a song stylist who told a story rather than a vocalist who sung lyrics.

Man please! Cheers all around and congrats!

Troy I can't get past her voice or her look. I agree it's a distraction. Other than that it will be nice to see such an amazing artist gain a higher profile. I wish that Kimberly Elise, or better yet Anika Noni Rose would have been chosen for the role. I really can't get around her look, which sucks. Rose can sing, she actually could pull off the transformation and her body shape has the power that I associate with Nina Simone. What I mean by body shape is that Nina was not as fragile or small as Zoe at least in any picture of video I've seen of her. This has a world of potential but it was definitely a poor casting decision.

Pioneer I've often said that the military would be a good option for guys straight out of high school. I've softened my position because we are warmongers looking for a fight. It may have been this way of course in the past, but today it just feels more blatant in disregard to maintaining a strong military that can act, vs a military that always acts. Cynique, as sexist as your son sounds, I was with him. I was a part of the first Fighter Squadron VF-213, that allowed women to fly F-14s. I was completely against this as I worked on the jets and felt that women simply weren't strong enough to fly the jet. Some men had problems with older F-14s which were pneumatic, hydraulic and electronic flight systems vs F-18s which were fly by wire and much easier to control. I was getting ready to get out when the squadron began work ups (getting ready for cruise by flying to the ship to test out new crew). I told my chief and my shop that this new lady pilot was going to die. 6 months later here is the story: http://articles.latimes.com/1994-10-27/news/mn-55338_1_dagny-hultgreen My sister was in the Navy and I didn't have a problem with women being on ships or in the Navy, I just knew that certain jets shouldn't be flown by women. I also didn't think that a woman could be in certain aspects of Aviation because of the heavy labor, but we couldn't speak out and say much and today, I typically avoid the dialogue. Planes are easier to fly now. The F-14 is retired and most female pilots are assigned to fly-by-wire aircraft squadrons or as Rios or Navigators... but I wasn't wrong and if someone had listened to me when I was taking my terminal leave that lady would probably be alive. They trained her on F-14 Ds and sent her to a squadron with the oldest jets at Miramar...bad move altogether.

Up until President Truman ordered the armed forces integrated in 1950, the Navy was considered the most racist branch of the military and the consensus was that Negroes in the Navy could never expect to serve in any capacity other than menial positions such as Aides or Sewards or Cooks which was what Dorrie Miller was, the heroic black sailor made famous for grabbing a machine gun and joining his crew mates in shooting down Japanese planes during the raid on Pearl Harbor. During World War II, my brother joined the Navy and quite a few people, a lot of whom were his friends, couldn't understand why, considering how prejudiced it was. Everybody else just waited to be drafted into the Army. I was just a kid then and I don't remember the reason he gave, but I think my father advised him to do so, something about enlisted men having more options(?). I do know that he scored very high on the tests given and was eventually assigned to the USS Mason which was the first vessel manned by an all black crew. I also remember him recounting an incident when he was stationed in Norfolk, Virgina, and was coming back from leave waiting for a bus to take him back to the base. When the bus arrived and he tried to get on, the driver told him the bus was so crowded that there was no room in the back of it which was where Negroes were expected to sit in the south, so he couldn't board it. According to my brother, what the bus was crowded with was a bunch of drunk sailors who became indignant about a fellow sailor being told to get off, and they rushed forward, threw the driver out, and one of them drove the bus back to the base. Later in the 1980s, my son joined the Navy and served on the USS Eisenhower, an aircraft carrier which spent 90 days on alert in the Indian Ocean during the Persian Gulf hostage crises. He never reported any racial incidents among the crew of about 2000, but he was among the great numbers of sailors and navy vets disgusted with the decision to integrate the sexes in the arm forces, something which resulted in women being assigned to the Eisenhower. He couldn't believe they'd allow females to trespass on this hallowed ground of male exclusivity!

Great work Brother Troy. Thank you for your ongoing commitment to books by us and for us, and for your dedication to celebrating the works and expressions of those of Afrikan descent. Amari