Toni Braxton takes on her first starring role to date, in the upcoming Lifetime original movie, “Twist of Faith,” and she found a strong connection with her on screen character, Nina, a singer in a gospel choir.
“I sang in the choir. I went to college to be a teacher – she’s a school teacher,” Toni told Access Hollywood Live’s Billy Bush and Kit Hoover on Monday of the similarities between herself and her character. “[She is everything] I would’ve been had my moment not happened at that gas station that one day.”
As fans of the singer know, “that gas station” moment was when Toni was discovered by Bill Pettaway, a producer, who was working with a then-emerging Milli Vanilli, and heard her singing while she was filling her tank.
Toni’s new Lifetime film sees the singer and actress paring up with David Julian Hirsh on screen.
David plays Jacob Fisher, an Orthodox Jewish Cantor, who after losing his family, ends up abandoning his identity and goes wandering, landing in the town Toni’s Nina lives in. The two have chemistry and sparks fly.
There is some on screen smooching, but Toni said it was an unusual experience.
“Kissing is odd, and it’s not as comfortable as you think,” she said. “You have to block it a few times and it’s choreographed — like he comes in and I come in… and the camera zooms up.”
While Toni’s Nina and David’s Jacob find romance in “Twist of Faith,” premiering Saturday, February 9 at 8/7c on Lifetime, Toni herself is single.
“I’m not really dating,” she said. “I need to get back on that horse again.
“I’m not very comfortable dating,” she added. “I was married for a while so I have to get comfortable dating [and having] someone in my space. I really don’t like the dating process.”
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