Whitney Houston featured prominently in the In Memoriam section of the Academy Award ceremony currently taking place at the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood. Although best known as a musician, she made a respectable contribution to cinema, and in fact was preparing to release a film she produced and acted in before her death earlier this month.
Houston's main claim to movie immortality comes by way of her debut acting role, in the 1992 picture The Bodyguard. Starring opposite Kevin Costner, Houston did well as a musician who becomes romantically entangled with her security guard, though the character appeared similar to her real-life persona. A song on the film's soundtrack, a cover of Dolly Parton's I Will Always Love You, became a massive worldwide hit.
In 1995, Houston followed it up with Waiting to Exhale, a fondly-remembered account of four African-American women and their relationship troubles. A year later she acted opposite Denzel Washington in the family Christmas film, The Preacher's Wife.
In 2001 Houston embarked on a new project: feature film production. Her first was tween classic The Princess Diaries, which gave Ann Hathaway her first starring role opposite Julie Andrews. Her latest, Sparkle, stars American Idol winner Jordin Sparks, opposite Houston herself in a story about the Motown girl groups of the 1960s.
