The drooling bigot’s mother (a thankless part for Vanessa Redgrave) turns young Cecil into a house servant. He leaves home when he’s of age (no surprise) and another mentor helps him land a job at a hotel in Washington, D.C. That leads to work at the White House, where he’s told by his new boss, “You never listen or react to conversation. You hear nothing, you see nothing, you only serve.”
Fortunately for Cecil, and the film, his African American co-workers are a gregarious lot, especially Carter Wilson (Cuba Gooding Jr.) and James Holloway (Lenny Kravitz), and the banter they exchange both on and off the job is one of the film’s strengths.
The same is true for Cecil’s strong union with his wife, which is helped by the obvious acting bond formed by the effective work of Whitaker and Winfrey. These two are especially good when Cecil’s long hours at the White House cause his wife to understandably feel neglected, which leads to a prolonged flirtation with the rascal next door (the always effective Terrence Howard).