Monique Coleman is returning to TV to play an R&B singer in a new Lifetime movie, but don’t expect the High School Musical alum to flex her vocal talents in the film.
Coleman, 44, plays lead character Neveah in Trapped in the Spotlight, a movie she also co-executive produced.
In the movie, canceled R&B duo Neveah and Lupita (Melyssa Ford) fight for their lives after a crazed record producer kidnaps them and locks them in a studio, forcing the pair to complete their unfinished final album.
While the movie lends itself to Coleman showcasing her voice, she told Us Weekly exclusively that she does not sing in the film.
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High School Musical took over 7.7 million TV screens in the United States when it premiered in 2006, making it the highest-rated Disney Channel Original Movie at the time. The film followed basketball star Troy Bolton (Zac Efron) and an intelligent transfer student, Gabriella (Vanessa Hudgens), as they break the status quo of East High […]
“It was such a specific style, and they were supposed to be the biggest stars of this time,” she explained. “I am a musical theater girl, as we know, and I love my power ballad, but to portray that R&B soulful kind of sound, I really felt like, ‘Let’s bring someone in who, this is what she does.’”
The filmmakers hired an artist named Kira to handle the singing instead, which Coleman said she did “beautifully.”
“It’s got this resonance that I think is going to stand on its own separate from the movie,” she added.
Coleman continued to laud the music, which she said she was not involved in producing. She added that having someone else sing for her shouldn’t take away from her performance.
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“I’m not ashamed of that. A lot of times people are very apt to feel like you’re a one-person show and that you’re doing everything and that you’re the star,” she said. “It doesn’t take anything away from me to have this beautiful woman voice this character and to get to embody that because it informed me as to who she was.”
Additionally, Coleman said she relates to her character as someone whose TV acting career began in her early 20s.
“I think one of the aspects of this character is just what happens when you achieve fame maybe a little bit before you’re ready to, and not to say that that is my exact story, but I do understand that we like to cancel people because we can be a little bit judgmental,” she explained. “We like to see you in the limelight, and then we like to watch you fall.”
Trapped in the Spotlight premieres Saturday, February 15, at 8 p.m. ET on Lifetime.
With reporting by Christina Garibaldi.
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