Angela Bassett is stepping behind the camera to make her directorial debut with the project for America’s Lifetime network and she has cast The Butler star as the tragic R&B icon, according to TVLine.com.

The film, tentatively-titled I Will Always Love You: The Whitney Houston Story, will focus on the singer’s rise to fame, her turbulent marriage to Bobby Brown and her drug issues. It is expected to air next year.

DaCosta rose to prominence as a competitor on reality TV show America’s Next Top Model and has since established herself as an actress with roles on US soap opera All My Children, medical drama House and comedy Ugly Betty.

Last year she also landed a small part in Lee Daniels’ The Butler.

Houston’s manager and sister-in-law, Pat Houston, recently blasted plans to turn the late superstar’s life story into a TV project, insisting she is “certainly worthy of more than a television movie”.

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