(L-R) Derik Murray, Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson, and Joseph Patel attend the 2025 Sundance Film Festival “SLY LIVES! (aka The Burden of Black Genius)” premiere at Eccles Theatre. (Photo by George Pimentel/Shutterstock for Sundance Film Festival)
By Jessica Herndon
The world’s stage has long been captivated by the electrifying sound and presence of Sly & The Family Stone, a band that shattered boundaries and united audiences across racial and musical divides. Now, the enigmatic force behind it all, Sly Stone, steps into the spotlight in SLY LIVES! (aka The Burden of Black Genius), a documentary debuting in the Premieres section at the 2025 Sundance Film Festival.
Back in Park City after his documentary Summer of Soul (…Or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised) debuted and took home both the Audience Award: U.S. Documentary and also the Grand Jury Prize: U.S. Documentary at the 2021 Sundance Film Festival, Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson moves audiences again with a feature that pays homage to Black creativity and explores the costs of being a trailblazer.
From his early days as a San Francisco radio host and producer, Sly Stone was a musical innovator with a vision that transcended genres and social boundaries. In the late 1960s, when racial tensions were high and music scenes were starkly segregated, Sly & The Family Stone emerged as a symbol of unity. The band’s makeup — a mix of Black and white musicians — and its sound — a blend of funk, soul, rock, and psychedelic pop — spoke to a belief that music could bridge divides. Tracks like “Everyday People” and “Dance to the Music” became instant anthems, resonating with fans of all backgrounds.
But SLY LIVES! (aka The Burden of Black Genius) doesn’t simply linger in the glow of that success. With deep access to historical and personal archives, and a knack for humanizing legends, Questlove peels back the layers of Sly Stone’s life, asking: What is the burden of Black genius? Through rare footage, a beloved soundtrack, and candid interviews with Sly’s children, bandmates, and artists like D’Angelo, André 3000, and Q-Tip, the documentary paints a vivid portrait of a man’s brilliance — and the weight of that dazzling radiance.
After the film concludes, Eugene Hernandez, director of the Sundance Film Festival, recognizes Questlove’s ability to make Sly so relatable in the movie and asks if it was liberating to be able to show him as not only a genius, but as a regular Black man. When he began his career back in the early ’90s, Questlove says one of his goals was to figure out what role he could inhabit in the world. “I looked at what history has allowed examples to be, as far as what is our role for most Black people. Like five categories, maybe four, are really allowed: of course, the over-sexualized, Mandingo factor; the kind of scary, vicarious gangster, hide your daughter, that person; three would be, like, something about you is ambiguous — you got to sort of blend in and code-switch your way into the system; and of course, tried and true buffoonish joke.” Met with nodding heads in the audience, Questlove continues. “But that fifth space that I was always obsessed with — that I don’t think we were really allowed — is we can either be superhuman, give credit to our race, or are subhuman. You’re either plus two or negative two just to get to that middle ground — zero space.”
For Questlove, and for most of us Black folks, this plight is extremely frustrating. We are constantly fighting against having to address questions like, “Are we truly relatable? Are we truly equal? Do I see you as how I see myself?” Questlove continues. “I would like to think that’s where Sly was going because the fact that he’s just so free to make funky nursery rhyme songs — and also be as esoteric or grandiose or as talented as anybody that you would put up against him — he’s trying to cover all of those bases. I just think now is the time where we’re really comfortable. We’re talking about our mental health and things that we normally wouldn’t talk about in history. I felt like this is a great example because, of course, this is not just the Sly story. I’ve always dreamt of having an intervention talk with my community. And I guess this is how we did it.”
Sly’s story includes extraordinary highs and intense lows, and the film charts his rise to stardom, his battle with drug addiction, and the toll of staying relevant. But despite his struggles, his core message that we should all come together, and Questlove’s message that we are all human, remain vital.
