Adam Johnson, the mercurial trumpet player at the heart of Leo Penn's sharp-edged character study may be fictional, but Sammy Davis Jr. brings him to indelible life. The verisimilitude springs in part because cowriters Les and Tina Pine (née Rome) used Miles Davis as a model for the troubled musician. Life would also imitate art, in a manner of speaking, when Miles wed Davis Jr.'s costar, Cicely Tyson, in 1981. Director Penn, who transitioned from acting in the wake of the blacklist, introduces Adam as a mean drunk who throws money at hecklers, insults blind bandmates, and kicks an elderly gentleman out of his apartment clad in nothing but pajamas.
That gentleman, Willie, takes the form of Louis Armstrong as a fellow trumpeter crashing at his pad while performing in New York (Adam's pal, played by Ossie Davis, handled the arrangement). That's when Adam, who's been seeing the superficial Theo (Davis Jr. protégé Lola Falana) first sets eyes on Willie's more substantial granddaughter, Claudia (Tyson). Unusual for the time, she eschews false eyelashes and straight hair for a natural look. Though she isn't introduced as a Black Panther, the organization also emerged in 1966, and she has a record for civil disobedience. Despite Adam's volatility, she senses his fundamental goodness and deflects his intimidation tactics with ease. As she comes to find, there's a tragic backstory involving a wife and child. He's also been mentoring aspiring trumpeter Vinny (22-year-old Frank Sinatra Jr. in an eerie simulacrum of his father), the only white member of the retinue. As Adam and Claudia grow closer, he eases up on the drink until an ugly encounter with a racist cop in Upstate New York sends him into a drunken spiral. From then on, it's a struggle to live up to Claudia's expectations while trying to control his anger at cold-hearted business types, like Manny (former Rat Packer Peter Lawford), who treat him like a money-making machine, and at himself for the people he's alienated, injured—and worse. A quality production from top to bottom, this Embassy Pictures production hasn't gotten its due, despite the talent involved.
Among numerous highlights, Benny Carter provided the score, Nat Adderly dubbed Davis Jr's trumpet playing, and the Hubley Studios provided the animated opening titles. Though it isn't a musical in the conventional sense, Penn makes time for first-rate singing and playing, and even some hilarious stage patter, from Davis Jr., Armstrong, and Mel Tormé who drops by for a party sequence (his "All That Jazz" also plays over the closing credits). Look sharp, and you'll even spot a gangly Morgan Freeman amongst the partygoers. In its visceral depiction of the ways racism and trauma can eat away at the hardiest of souls, A Man Called Adam speaks to today as much to the civil rights era it depicts from the perspective of the Black musicians who played in integrated bands to integrated audiences while navigating a world that accepted them as entertainers but not as full-fledged human beings. Highest recommendation.