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Whitney Houston Biopic ‘I Wanna Dance With Somebody’ Gets First Trailer

Sony has released the first-look trailer to I Wanna Dance With Somebody. The film follows the life and legacy of the late Whitney Houston played by The End of the F—ing…

World Music Awards 2004 - Show

LAS VEGAS, NV ? SEPTEMBER 15: Singer Whitney Houston is seen performing on stage during the 2004 World Music Awards at the Thomas and Mack Center on September 15, 2004 in Las Vegas, Nevada.

(Photo by Kevin Winter/Getty Images)

Sony has released the first-look trailer to I Wanna Dance With Somebody. The film follows the life and legacy of the late Whitney Houston played by The End of the F---ing World star Naomi Ackie. Ackie will portray the legendary singer alongside Ashton Sanders as Bobby Brown and Stanley Tucci as Clive Davis. Clarke Peters will be playing John Houston, Whitney’s father, and Tamara Tunie will be portraying Cissy Houston, Whitney’s mother.

"My dream? Sing what I want to sing, be how I want to be," Ackie’s Houston says in the trailer. "Reach as big an audience as I can."

Naomi Ackie admits she was "very" nervous to play the "incredible, multifaceted" Whitney Houston. "She's been elevated in my life for so long that it felt like an impossible thing to achieve at times," she told PEOPLE. "But so many people told me the same thing: If I wasn't scared and nervous, they'd think something was wrong with me. ... The biggest challenge was letting my fear of the magnitude of this task take a back seat. Nothing good comes from sitting in fear for too long."

I Wanna Dance with Somebody is written by Anthony McCarten, the screenwriter behind the 2018 Freddie Mercury biopic Bohemian Rhapsody, and produced by Clive Davis.

Ackie told the outlet that filmmakers "managed to fit in so many of our favorite songs" from Houston's career into the film. They've also managed to include "parts of her life that we know about but through the scope of her own internal world."

"Fans can expect to see her life like we see are our own. Ups and downs, triumphs and disappointments, all of it mixing together to make up a life," said Ackie.

The biopic hits theaters Dec. 21. Take a look at the trailer to I Wanna Dance With Somebody below:

Autumn Hawkins is the National Hip-Hop and R&B writer for Beasley Media, currently residing in New Jersey. Prior to working at Beasley Media, she was in broadcast news as an entertainment producer. When she's not impatiently waiting for Beyoncé to drop new music, she is reading, shopping, or planning a vacation.