For the past 30 years, Mary J. Blige, aptly crowned the Queen of Hip-Hop and R&B, has spilled her guts in her music, flooring audiences with her haunting tracks like "Not Gon' Cry" and "No More Drama."
The multi-platinum Grammy winner has lived out many triumphs in the spotlight throughout her career beyond her music, including two Oscar nominations, for her supporting role and song in Netflix's "Mudbound," and her work in the fan-favorite drama series "Power Book II: Ghost." However, as much as her fans have celebrated Blige's successes, she's also been open about her hard times, which have included addiction, abuse and her tumultuous divorce following a 15-year marriage.
She reflects on all of that, and more, in the new Amazon Prime Video documentary "Mary J. Blige's My Life."
Told in five parts — "What I've Seen," "Life Can Only Be What You Make It," "You Should Never Fake It," "You'll Be at Peace With Yourself" and "My Life in the Sunshine" — the documentary starts with Blige's parents' divorce when she was just 5. Over cartoon graphics, Blige describes what she endured after moving to the Schlobohm housing projects in Yonkers, New York, with her mother and older sister — an increasingly hostile environment in which Blige learned to put on emotionlessness and invulnerability.
Though Blige leaned into her "around-the-way girl" image with her debut album, it did not capture the complete picture of who she was.
"I didn't smile ever when I was a teenager," Blige explained, because smiling symbolized weakness to her.
The singer's life changed the moment producer Andre Harrell pulled up to Schlobohm and she began belting out Anita Baker's "Rapture" album. But by that point, what Blige had gone through as a 5-year-old — whom she refers to in third-person as her baby — and a young woman was way more than many people go through in a lifetime.
No amount of fame or fortune to come could erase that trauma.
Despite affirmations from others about her talent and what she was capable of, Blige said she had no self-worth or confidence — even after witnessing her star rise in the wake of her debut album, "What's The 411?"
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"I didn't know I was me," Blige says at one point in the documentary, reflecting on that period.
However, she had the foresight to know she needed to express herself to keep living. And, as the documentary suggests, Blige was determined to keep fighting — or at the very least keep singing until she acquired the happiness she always desired.
Three decades later, Blige has not only survived but she's also given other people the ability to do so.
It was that same sense of joy that Roy Ayers sang about in his 1976 single "Everybody Loves the Sunshine," which serves as the primary sample from the title track on "My Life," her sophomore album and the one that solidified her reputation as more than just another singer. Through the songs and lyrics on "My Life," she displayed a level of vulnerability and pain in a way Black women had rarely been able to do in music previously.
Then just 23, Blige's celebrity was exploding, but she reveals in the documentary that she'd never felt more insecure. Despite her megatalent, our cultural obsession with celebrity meant people were primarily focused on her tumultuous, violative relationship with Cedric "K-Ci" Hailey of the R&B group Jodeci. Blige explains that the chaos and violence of that entanglement also brought to the forefront devastating events from her childhood that she thought she'd buried.
Blige, who had been trying to deliver her follow-up to "What's the 411?" amid all of that, allowed her pain and sorrow to be reflected in "My Life" — and her cry for help remains potent even today.
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Before "My Life," many Black female singers sang about relationships, pain and having their heart broken. Still, these regal figures like Aretha Franklin and Anita Baker presented a picturesque image of Black womanhood to the general public amid their songs about heartbreak. Blige's torment in the title song and other tracks like "Be With You" and "I Never Wanna Live Without You" allowed listeners to experience a level of vulnerability that hadn't been seen since Ma Rainey or Nina Simone.
It was certainly different for the early '90s, when Black women in hip-hop or who were hip-hop adjacent were expected to have a more hardened image — like Salt-N-Pepa or Queen Latifah. Industry gatekeepers, all of whom were male and most of whom were white, determined that "harder" female acts worked best within the supposedly masculine genre. Though Blige leaned into her "around-the-way girl" image with her debut album, it did not capture the complete picture of who she was.
Blige's candor about that complete picture, and fans' true captivation with her work, began with "My Life."
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While the documentary in part focuses on aspects of Blige's increasingly violent relationship with Hailey, the singer's journey to "My Life" and beyond was much bigger than a failed relationship. The film makes it clear that this album was about learning to trust herself and her voice, as well as realizing her worth despite the things that had transpired in her life.
Three decades later, Blige has not only survived but she's also given other people the ability to do so.
In a documentary helmed by Oscar-winning director Vanessa Roth, the now-50-year-old singer is sharing even more of her journey and why writing that particular album saved her.
Using Blige's interviews from the present and the past, as well as interviews from Sean "P. Diddy" Combs; Blige's sister, LaTonya Blige; her "I Can Do Bad All by Myself" co-star Taraji P. Henson; Nasir "Nas" Jones; producer Chucky Thompson; and the aforementioned Andre Harrell, who died last year, Blige and others recount her entry into the music industry and how "My Life" (and her life) came to be.
She has become an icon and a symbol for Black women trying to cling to their dreams and self-worth despite endless outside forces trying to tear them down.
In the end, because she was vulnerable to the world instead of the tough person she thought for so long that she had to be, Blige transcended the image the industry made for her of just another Black girl from the hood who could sing. Instead, she has become an icon and a symbol for Black women trying to cling to their dreams and self-worth despite endless outside forces trying to tear them down.
With “My Life,” Blige saved herself — and reminded her fans their selves were worth saving as well.
