An inherited piano takes on immense meaning for a family in Pittsburgh in 1936 in “The Piano Lesson” by August Wilson. Generational ties also permeate the film adaptation, in which Malcolm Washington follows in his father Denzel Washington’s footsteps by helping bring the entirety of The Pittsburgh Cycle, a series of 10 plays, to the screen.

Malcolm Washington didn’t start from scratch in his successful film debut. He recruited much of the cast of the recent Broadway revival featuring Samuel L. Jackson (Doaker Charles), his brother, John David Washington (Boy Willie), Ray Fisher (Lymon) and Michael Potts (Whining Boy). Berniece, played by Danielle Brooks in the play, is now beautifully played by Danielle Deadwyler. With such rich material and a cast for whom it’s second nature, one imagines it would be hard to go wrong. Jackson’s own history with the play dates back to its original performance in 1987, when he was Boy Willie.

It’s not the easiest thing to make a work look cinematic, but Malcolm Washington was up to the task. His film opens up the world of the Charles family beyond the living room. In fact, this adaptation, which Washington co-wrote with “Mudbound” screenwriter Virgil Williams, goes beyond Wilson’s text and shows us the past and origins of the intricately engraved piano that is central to all the fuss. It even begins with a great action-packed piece in 1911, during which the piano is stolen from a white family’s home. Another develops Doaker’s monologue in which he explains to the uninitiated, Fisher’s Lymon, and to the audience, the tortuous history of the affair. While it would have been nice to keep the camera focused on Jackson, such a great and pivotal presence throughout, the good news is that he really makes the storytelling shine as well.

Wilson purists will surely have opinions on these artistic choices; But they let the film breathe a bit, offering a respite from the living room with the looming piano. And most of the film stays there, in 1936. Boy Willie and Lymon arrive early one morning, uninvited, to Berniece and her Uncle Doaker’s house in Pittsburgh. It’s a family reunion with an agenda: They’ve driven a truck full of watermelons north to Mississippi, and Willie, Berniece’s younger brother, wants to sell the watermelons and then the piano. The dusty old instrument represents for him an opportunity to leave the past behind and start a future. With the money he wants to buy the land that his enslaved ancestors worked. Berniece has other ideas about the piano: keep it. It is a connection to the past, not an anchor. Plus, it could be haunted.

Yes, “The Piano Lesson,” which opens in theaters Friday and streams on Netflix Nov. 22, isn’t just a meditation on family history. It’s also a literal ghost story, with creaks, ghosts, and shadows lurking when the piano is played. Deadwyler is electric as Berniece, who bears the brunt of the brooding, walking on eggshells in her life, trying to care for her young daughter and fend off the passes of men who assume she can only be satisfied with one at her side. side. Now he must deal with his somewhat manic brother, who might, Doaker wisely remembers, actually, annoyingly, be right. Perhaps the film academy will make up for the snub of his performance in “Till” with this twist.

Regardless of your familiarity with Wilson’s Pittsburgh cycle, “The Piano Lesson” is a valuable, captivating and moving watch, full of charismatic performers. Talent isn’t always genetic, but the Washington family is working hard to prove otherwise. And with “Fences,” “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom,” and now “The Piano Lesson,” they are making their mark with a bold, ambitious project that probably should have arrived a long time ago. Only seven more to go.

“The Piano Lesson,” which premieres on Netflix on Friday and streams Nov. 22, is rated PG-13 by the Motion Picture Association for “strong language, violent content, some suggestive references and smoking.” Duration: 125 minutes. Three stars out of four.