Yaya DaCosta Cast As Whitney Houston In Angela Bassett's Lifetime Movie

Yaya DaCosta will play legendary singer Whitney Houston in Lifetime's biopic, due out in 2015, TVLine reported.

DaCosta made her small-screen debut on "America's Next Top Model" Cycle 3, but has since appeared in "All My Children," Ugly Betty," House" and "Lee Daniels' The Butler." In the Lifetime movie, she'll play Houston as she deals with her volatile relationship with Bobby Brown and her early success in the music industry.

Angela Bassett will make her directorial debut with the film, which is tentatively titled "Whitney Houston." Shem Bitterman wrote the script and Larry Sanitsky will produce. (Both worked on "Betty & Coretta," the Lifetime movie in which Bassett starred last year.) At the time the film was announced Bassett, who starred in 1995's "Waiting To Exhale" with Houston, said in a statement, "I have such regard for both Whitney's and Bobby's amazing talents and accomplishments; and I feel a responsibility in the telling of their story. Their humanity and bond fascinates us all. I'm beyond excited to have this opportunity to go behind the camera and into their world."