The death of Whitney Houston in February forced myriad adjustments around the release of the upcoming movie, “Sparkle,” and its soundtrack and music videos. One song’s video, “Celebrate”, was feature a cameo by Houston with Jordin Sparks. But without Houston, a new clip shows that Sparks pays homage to the fallen star.
In the video, Sparks throws a house party attended by her “Sparkle” cast mates, minus the late singer. Houston is in the video, however, via film footage. And Sparks sports a Whitney Houston T-shirt. The video is capped off with a message that reads “In loving memory of Whitney Houston.”
“When we did the song,” Sparks said to BET, “we planned on it being Whitney and me. But she’s not here, so we wanted to make it a tribute to her. So it’s fun, upbeat and exciting — there are clips from the movie and the main cast is in the video too.
“It’s me, Tika Sumpter, Carmen Ejogo, Derek Luke, Omari Hardwick … Goapele is in it and Mike Epps. We’re all just having a good time [and the premise is] they all come over to my house singing along to Whitney’s music. And we’re missing her and celebrating her as well. It’s actually pretty simple, but when you watch it and hear her voice along with it, it makes it so much more.”
