16 Most Dramatic Moments from 'Whitney,' the Lifetime Biopic of Whitney Houston

From meeting Bobby Brown to crack-fueled crack-ups, the scenes that made us well....

"Whitney," starring Yaya Costa as Houston, centers on the singer's life with her husband of 14 years, Bobby Brown. It begins in 1989, the year that they met, and ends shortly after the birth of their only child together, Bobbi Kristina, in 1993. However, that leaves plenty of time for drama:

Yaya DaCosta as “Whitney Houston” in the new Lifetime original movie 'Whitney,' premiered Saturday, January 17th, 2015. 

There's an excellent reason "Directed by Angela Bassett" is plastered all over the ads for Lifetime's Whitney Houston biopic — entitled, simply, Whitney — and the reason is Aaliyah. Bassett is the network's way of saying, "We're sorry. We promise we won't screw things up like when we let Wendy Williams do that Aaliyah flick. This one will be all about Quality. This time we're bringing in an Oscar-nominated Hollywood leading lady who starred in Waiting To Exhale — you remember, the movie where Whitney sang that 'Shoop Shoop' song. Give us another chance, America. We promise there will be music and romance. And drugs. Lots of those."

Whitney tells the Bobby Browns side of the story, rather than her mama Cissy Houston's side, already detailed in the heartfelt 2013 memoir Remembering Whitney. (Best line: "As much as I love my daughter, Nippy was no angel. She could be a straight-up heifer to people.") In this version, Bobby is the innocent victim corrupted by Whitney's party-hearty habits. She's the one who lures him into drugs, snorting up a storm while he clutches his beer and says, "I'll stick with this." 

Fans might have an issue or two with the dubious pro-Bobby angle, but Yaya DeCosta makes a likeable heroine. She was a runner-up on Season Three of America's Top Model, which might explain why she does so much smizing in her version of "I'm Every Woman." She's almost too animated to play Whitney — she's a much better dancer, though you can tell she's making an effort to hold back. The actual singing is by Deborah Cox, the Nineties R&B diva fondly remembered for "Nobody's Supposed To Be Here," which ruled the radio the same winter as Whitney's "Heartbreak Hotel" and will always reduce me to a puddle of slush.

1. The Start Of Their Relationship: In real life, Houston met Brown at the Soul Train Music Awards in 1989, where Brown performed "My Prerogative." (In the TV movie, he sings "Every Little Step," but the outfit is pretty spot-on.) However, if the rest of the scene is to be believed, their first interaction was an icy one, and their relationship was tough at first, with Houston doing drugs recreationally while Brown abstained (Brown has said in the past that she did drugs "way before" they got together). The film also showed Houston struggling to accept the mothers of her beau's children. At one point, while they weren't together, Brown impregnated one of his babies' mothers. The scene in which he tells Houston is explosive.

2. Cissy Houston's Disapproval Of Their Romance: "I'm getting married!" Houston gushes to her family in the film. "I just hope it's not Bobby Brown," shot back her mother, Cissy. "I spent my life trying to keep you and your brothers out of the projects. Now you're marrying into them?" Throughout the rest of the film, Brown and the Houston matriarch don't seem to have much of a relationship. In reality, Cissy wasn't a big fan of Brown's, with whom she told the Associated Press in 2013 that she doesn't keep in contact. "[Whitney] was with someone who, like her, wanted to party," she once wrote of her daughter's relationship with Brown. "To me, he never seemed to be a help to her in the way she needed."

3. Whitney's Miscarriage: In 1993, Houston told Barbara Walters that she had a miscarriage during the filming of "The Bodyguard," which is documented in the film. (Yes, she's wearing her Rachel Marron's glamorous headscarf in that scene.) The aftermath, which features Houston sobbing to Cissy, who reiterates that she shouldn't be with Brown, is heart-wrenching, mimicking the real-life horror the singer felt. "It was very painful, emotionally and physically," she told Walters of the experience. "I was back on the set the next day. And it's over. But I had Bobbi Kristina one year later, and I am blessed."

4. Bobby's Infidelity: In the film, Brown puts his career on the back-burner to support Houston after her miscarriage and the birth of their daughter. Eventually, especially after a woman calls him "Mr. Houston," Brown, self-conscious and with a bruised ego, begins partying too hard and sleeping with other women. Houston catches him and erupts. "Both of us cheated on each other," he confirmed to Lifetime recently. "So that's hard to swallow for both of us. I just think when two people that love each other as much as we loved each other, when they start drifting apart different people come into the situation, into the scenario, and we make mistakes." In the film, she gives him another chance.

5. Bobby's Friend Is Killed In Front of Him: In the film, during a rocky period for Brown and Houston, the New Edition singer's friend was shot and killed in front of him as they left a club. (He calls Houston, who answers the phone mid-performance and then returns to the stage.) Shortly thereafter, Brown is seen dishing about his wife's substance abuse in group counseling only to have his admissions appear in the National Enquirer shortly thereafter. In real life, their relationship was tabloid fodder at that time, and Brown, who was treated for alcohol abuse at the Betty Ford Center, really did bear witness to a pal's murder.

Bassett or no Bassett, Whitney is still an intensive Lifetime melodrama, using all the tricks of the trade: 

a young woman with big dreams, a man who fails her, family disapproval, career pressure, motherhood, lies, tears, long talks with Babyface. 

6. Whitney meets Bobby, feels the heat.
First scene: our girl in her limo, en route to the 1989 Soul Train Awards, sighing, "Time to become Whitney Houston." You can instantly tell this is the kind of low-budget Lifetime movie where they scrounge up a couple dozen extras to play an entire mob of fans swarming the red carpet. Whitney is transfixed by seeing Bobby sing "Every Little Step." They flirt backstage, joking about how she didn't win any awards. ("I'm happy for my girl Anita" — sure you are, Whitney). Right before she goes onstage to sing "The Greatest Love of All," she declares, "As of tonight, I am a Bobby Brown fan!" What could go wrong?

7. Their first date.
Shopping, obviously. "We are in Beverly Hills, baby! Rodeo Drive!" Bobby yells. They get mobbed by fans on the sidewalk — it looks like the same extras from the Soul Train Awards. Time-warp factor: Bobby has to ask if anyone wants a photo with him. Fans were so much more polite back then!

8. Bobby opens his mail.
Bobby is grooving to his Walkman on the terrace when his maid brings the mail. Nice haul: There's a check for $24 million and an invitation to Whitney Houston's 26th birthday party. The invitation helpfully reads, "You Are Cordially Invited to Whitney Houston's 26th Birthday Party."

9. Whitney saves all her love, none of her drugs for Bobby.
Whitney lures Bobby upstairs, casually snorting fistfuls of blow as she walks him through her private trophy room, with a piano and gold records all over the walls. (Jesus, that is some un-Whit-worthy wood paneling.) He looks into her eyes and charms her with his patented Bobby Brown sweet-talk: "Up close, you are so friggin' beautiful." Before you know it, they're bonding over her VHS tape of the Seventies girl-group movie Sparkle. ("Irene Cara, she was something!" "Wasn't she?") When Whitney confesses that she tends to scare men away, he replies, "Maybe they just don't know how to handle you. Not like Bobby Brown would!"

10. The guy who plays Clive Davis is a scream.
Mark Rolston needs to play all schmoozy record-label bosses in Lifetime movies from now on. (He was a sleazy detective on The Shield as well as a white supremacist in Lethal Weapon 

11. "How's my favorite staaaaah?" Clive gushes as Whitney struts into his office in a yellow power suit. But he plotzes when she takes out a cigarette. "Not in my office! Whitney, you need to protect the voice. And stay away from yellow — it makes you look like a canary."

12. Their first fight!
Whitney and Bobby attend a banquet honoring her contributions to the United Negro College Fund, but Mr. My Prerogative gets jealous after seeing Eddie Murphy flirt with her via a remote video link from the set of Another 48 Hours. On their way home, in the back of her limo, the tension explodes into a tickle fight.

13. Whitney watches Sparkle alone in her room.
As our girl once sang, "When the night falls, loneliness calls." Whit lounges in her pajamas, eating cold spaghetti while she recites the dialogue out loud along with her favorite movie. It's the dressing-room scene where the mother confronts Lonette McKee about her no-account thug boyfriend: "Baby, he's just gonna drag you to the gutter with him." Foreshadowing!

14. Whitney tells her family she's getting married.
Her mama's immediate reaction: "I hope it's not Bobby Brown." Cissy, for some reason, is not 100 per cent overjoyed at the idea of her little Nippy marrying the artist who's about to release "Humpin' Around." Yet it's all blamed on Cissy's snobbery, as she scoffs, "You can take the boy out the ghetto, but you can't take the ghetto out the boy." (Cissy is the fantastic Suzanne Douglas, who played one of Bassett's girlfriends in How Stella Got Her Groove Back.)

15. Downward spiral time.
Suffering from career decline and writer's block, Bobby sits at the piano crumpling up pieces of paper . Then he calls L.A. Reid's assistant, screams "You just tell him Bobby Brown got some brand new licks that's about to blow his mind!" and slams down the phone.

16. Bobby tries to come between Whitney and her crack pipe.

Bad move, Bobby. She starts slapping him in the chest and screaming tearfully, i.e. the universal sign that you are entering the final 15 minutes of a Lifetime movie. That sets up the big ending: Whitney belts "I Will Always Love You," while Bobby stands on the side of the stage and feels the pain. Bit-tah-sweet. Memories. That's all I'm taking with me. Yeah, it's basically the same final scene as The Bodyguard. Can you blame them?