HOUSTON — You may know her from her breakout role on Broadway in Dreamgirls, and from dozens of movies and television shows over the years like "Waiting to Exhale "and "Grey’s Anatomy".
Loretta Devine was raised in the Acres Homes area of Houston and graduated from the University of Houston. She is now starring in the film “Bull Street,” showing in Houston this week.
Writer and director Lynn Dow talked with our Len Cannon. Dow said she wrote the script as a way of dealing with the loss of a grandmother she cherished.
"I could hear her voice telling me, 'Write, Lynn, write,'" Dow said.
“Bull Street” is loosely based on Dows own family in South Carolina. Devine plays the director's grandmother, a woman who loses her land because she was never given the deed. African American farmers often had land taken from them during the Jim Crow era.
Cannon asked the director if writing this movie helped with her grief.
"Yes. Writing ‘Bull Street’ helped my grief because it freed me through laughter and pain," Dow said.
"Would she be proud?” Cannon asked.
"Yes, I think she would smile and say, ‘Oh Lynn, you are talking about me to the world.’"
“Bull Street” is showing until Thursday, October 31 at the Regal Edwards Marqu'E off of the Katy Freeway.