Gabourey Sidibe

In Precious (2009), Gabourey Sidibe lets an abused teenager be sharp, stubborn and sometimes difficult company. Lee Daniels keeps pressing the suffering, but she keeps giving us reasons to be interested in the person enduring it. She does not insist that we approve of everything about the girl before we care. We were moved by her stubborn humour, because it persists through humiliations that could have reduced the character to someone we merely pitied. The performance makes this uneven drama worth facing.

That was her screen debut, and the work that followed has often called for a more outspoken Sidibe. Television became a substantial part of her career, through The Big C (2010–2013), American Horror Story (from 2013) and Empire (2015–2020). Becky, the sharp assistant she plays in Empire, gives her room for self-assurance and comic timing. The series also reunites her with Daniels.

Precious also makes clear how much better Sidibe is served when the film stops telling us what to feel. Andrew Dunn’s cinematography and Roshelle Berliner’s production design make the domestic scenes uncomfortable, but their fantasy passages draw attention away from the complicated person she is playing. Joe Klotz’s editing can make the move from abuse to comic relief feel premature. Mario Grigorov’s score presses emotions that Sidibe and Mo’Nique have already made clear. Our reservation is with Daniels’s handling of the material, particularly those moments when the music and changes of style distract us from his actors.

Quiet watchfulness does have its limits. Sidibe’s closed expression in Precious can keep us at a distance, even with the voice-over, and this is not a performance that makes every feeling easy to read. But the girl’s humour gives us enough contact to stay with her, without requiring Sidibe to explain every hurt. Begin with Precious, but not on an evening that calls for comfort.