- "Rise Up" singer Andra Day plays Billie Holiday in Hulu's The United States vs. Billie Holiday.
- She performs several Billie Holiday songs in the movie, including "Strange Fruit," making many wonder if she's actually singing or not.
- At the 93rd Academy Awards, Andra is nominated for Best Actress.
Andra Day dazzles as Billie Holiday in Hulu's biopic The United States vs. Billie Holiday. So much so, that her performance earned her the Best Actress in a Motion Drama award at this year's Golden Globes. Now, Andra is nominated for Best Actress at the 93rd Academy Awards.
At first, Andra was reluctant to play the jazz legend, who she and director Lee Daniels refer to as the "great godmother of civil rights." Of course, she went on to accept the role, deciding to face her fears "instead of asking for the storm to go away," as she described to Deadline. In many ways, the movie was an opportunity to share Billie with a whole new generation while educating audiences about how the government targeted the singer following the release of "Strange Fruit," a song inspired by her experiences witnessing the lynching of Black Americans.
Watching the movie, it's clear that Andra captures the many facets of Billie — her beauty, pain and power — while making the role her own after Diana Ross and Audra McDonald portrayed the iconic artist in Lady Sings the Blues and Lady Day, respectively. To better understand Billie, Andra completely adopted her lifestyle: She started smoking cigarettes, drank cold water and gin, and screamed or sang until her voice went hoarse, according to an interview in Entertainment Weekly.
So, does Andra really sing all of the Billie Holiday songs in the movie?
Everything you see and hear in the movie is 100% Andra. All of her preparation — the smoking, drinking and screaming — gave her voice the "gravel and grit" that the blues singer was known for. "Anything I'd do to take care of my voice as a singer, I did the opposite," she told EW.
Billie developed tone over years, but Andra knew she only had a matter of months, leading her to take more extreme measures to achieve the most accurate sound possible. Between the cigarettes, alcohol, vocal cord strain and regular practice with her dialect coach, Andra nailed the slow gravel that Billie's fans were drawn to. "It slowed me down in a way that allowed me to pay more attention to the emotional performance and being present with Lee [Daniels] and listening and being fluid with him and my cast," she explained to PBS NewsHour.
Although Andra had performed some of Billie's hits in the past (In 2017, she covered "Strange Fruit" to support the Equal Justice Initiative.), this was a totally new experience because she had the weight of a legend — her look, voice, musicality, triumphs and downfalls — on her shoulders. Speaking with W Magazine, she shared how nailing Billie's singing voice helped her dig deeper into the rest of her character: "At first it was nerve-wracking though because it's one thing when you're doing a one-off here or there, but to stay in it and believe it and live as her was definitely different. I will say once I was able to get to that point, the music and her voice helped me to drop into her."
