© Ryan Plummer Photography 2023When Stephanie Mills was just 11 years old, she walked onto the stage for amateur night at Harlem’s legendary Apollo Theater and never looked back — she won amateur night for six straight weeks and then hit the road with the Isley Brothers. That was the start of what would become an amazing, five-decade-long career. When we caught up with the Grammy-winning Mills, who’s beloved for iconic hits like “Never Knew Love Like This Before” and “Home,” she was literally heading “home” to Charlotte after performing in Los Angeles.
Mills, who just turned 66, was happy to carve out time to talk about her latest project in Lifetime’s Pride: A Seven Deadly Sins Story (it’s the fifth movie in the network’s successful Seven Deadly Sins anthology film franchise). The film debuts on Lifetime Saturday, April 8 at 8pm ET/PT.
“I haven’t acted in a long time,” Mills shares. “I loved playing Birdie. She’s strong, she loves her family, but she has a lot of pride that complicated a lot of relationships with her family. Ultimately love wins out, and that was wonderful.”
Inspired by a true story, Pride tells the tale of reality TV star Birdie Moore, whose carefully constructed world starts to crumble when her family secrets are brought to light. To salvage her legacy, Birdie must let go of the pride that distanced her from her son (Thomas Miles) and learn to reconnect in ways she wasn’t previously capable.
“The film hit home for me,” Mills says. “I’ve had people in my family who have passed away from cancer, so I can relate to that. Family is everything to me; it was everything to my mom and my dad, too. My mother never let anything get in between her children. For my mother, her children were everything, so I couldn’t relate to Birdie in that sense, but I knew the essence of her. I knew she was a strong Black woman who wanted the best for her children.”
The film also includes a touching segment that allows two Grammy-winning actresses — Erica Campbell also stars as a pastor in the film — to exercise their vocal range. “I think people are going to be pleasantly surprised,” Mills shares. “We sing together just a little bit, but it’s very nice. It’s in a scene when I’m in the hospital and I’m being tested for my cancer. And [Campbell] comes in as my pastor and I ask her to sing one of my favorite hymns and she was there to sing that.”
As for what makes Mills prideful and happy these days? “What makes me happy and makes me prideful is the fact that people come out to see me. Audiences still come out to see me. We just played [in Los Angeles], me and El DeBarge, and we sold out. And for me not to have any new music out, and for people to still come and pay their hard-earned money to see me is just amazing. I’ve never had what you call a regular job, so for me to still be in the game at this age and still doing well is a blessing, and that I’m proud of.”
She assures us, “I’m living my best life.”
While the actress and actors were great, the production of this film was just horrible I can’t believe Lifetime would ever allow something this bad to go out. The whole movie was so dark, you couldn’t see the actors faces, or was really had to watch. I just wonder if Lifetime allowed this because it is an all black cast.