Director Blitz Bazawule’s new musical adaptation of “The Color Purple” has a Certified Fresh 87% score on Rotten Tomatoes.

According to ScreenRant, the film’s 95% audience score surpasses Steven Spielberg’s 1985 adaptation starring Whoopi Goldberg as Celie, a Black Southern woman who struggles to find her identity amid decades of abuse in the early 1900s.

The new project reunites Spielberg, Oprah Winfrey, and Quincy Jones as executive producers on Bazawule’s feature. Variety reports that the Warner Bros. movie musical is an adaptation of the Tony-winning Broadway musical by Marsha Norman, Brenda Lee, Allee Willis, and Stephen Bray, based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Alice Walker.

Spielberg’s film, which is not a musical, reportedly grossed $142 million against a budget of $15 million. The beloved drama feature has a 73% Rotten Tomatoes score from critics and 94% from audiences.

We reported previously that Bazawule’s film had the largest Christmas Day opening for a movie since 2009 and the second-biggest Christmas Day opening of all time, it has solidly gone beyond expectations with an $18 million take from 3,152 theaters in North America.

On Rotten Tomatoes, one critic wrote, “It’s impossible to be unmoved by the material, the epic journey of the story and the powerful display of performance.”

Another added, “The Color Purple is a lavish and stirring cinematic experience that handles brutal themes with confidence and honesty. Alice Walker’s Pulitzer Prize winning novel gets a spectacular second adaptation that stands toe to toe with Spielberg’s original film.”

Meanwhile, “American Idol” winner Fantasia Barrino is getting rave reviews for her performance of Celie in Bazawule’s film. According to the Associated Press, she was initially reluctant to take on the role after performing in the Broadway production.

“I’m glad that I didn’t allow my fear of my past experience with Celie, because of where my life was at that time, to hinder me from doing something great,” Barrino said, per the Associated Press. “I’m riding on a high right now.”

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