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What it’s about
Cecil Gaines was a sharecropper's son who grew up in the 1920s as a domestic servant for the white family who casually destroyed his. Eventually striking out on his own, Cecil becomes a hotel valet of such efficiency and discreteness in the 1950s that he becomes a butler in the White House itself. There, Cecil would serve numerous US Presidents over the decades as a passive witness of history with the American Civil Rights Movement gaining momentum even as his family has troubles of its own. As his wife, Gloria, struggles with alcoholism and his defiant eldest son, Louis, strives for a just world, Cecil must decide whether he should take action in his own way.
Cast
Forest Whitaker
Cecil Gaines
Oprah Winfrey
Gloria Gaines
David Oyelowo
Louis Gaines
John Cusack
Richard Nixon
Jane Fonda
Nancy Reagan
Cuba Gooding Jr.
Carter Wilson
Mariah Carey
Hattie Pearl
Terrence Howard
Howard
Lenny Kravitz
James Holloway
Aml Ameen
Cecil Gaines (15)
Michael Rainey Jr.
Cecil Gaines (8)
James Marsden
John F. Kennedy
