Lance Reddick, Lucas Hedges and Terrence Howard also star in John Ridley’s Netflix drama chronicling Shirley Chisholm’s historic 1972 run for the Democratic presidential nomination.

Netflix’s Shirley is in so many ways a companion piece to the streaming platform’s recent Rustin that the two films could be entries in the same anthology series. Both shed light on influential Black political figures too long undervalued in historical accounts of their era. Both are driven by commanding performances from first-rate actors in the title roles. Both focus on specific chapters of the lives they depict, mostly skirting the clichés of cradle-to-grave biopics. But both also struggle to frame their subjects in the forceful dramatic terms they merit, getting stuck in too much expository talk and at times nudging reclamation into hagiography.

Thunder and lightning are precisely the qualities that writer-director John Ridley’s handsomely mounted but somewhat dutiful portrait could use more of. Which is not to say the movie’s a dud. It may be conventional but it’s never uninteresting, thanks to King and a strong ensemble in the key roles. And no one could argue with its value in bringing Chisholm’s achievements to the attention of younger generations perhaps unfamiliar with her legacy.

The schoolteacher whose roots were split between Brooklyn and Barbados broke the glass ceiling and remained in office for seven terms, representing the 12th congressional district of New York until 1983.

Established as feisty and not easily intimidated from the outset, she puts a good old boy irked that they make the same salary in his place, forges an allegiance with Black California congressman Ron Dellums (Dorian Crossmond Missick) and ignores his counsel when he advises her to stay in line and wait her turn. Instead, she tangles with House Speaker McCormack (Ken Strunk) over her assignment to the agricultural committee, an area of negligible benefit to her constituents in low-income urban Bedford-Stuyvesant.

Just two years later, when Florida women show financial support to put Chisholm on the primary ballot, Shirley decides to run for president, dismissing the doubts of her mentor, “Mac” Holder (Lance Reddick). Reasoning that candidates for the Democratic nomination are predominantly white middle-aged men, she feels strongly about the need for someone in the race who represents Blacks, women and Latinos, the youth and the working class.

Other key appointments include Stanley Townsend (Brian Stokes Mitchell) as the campaign manager with whom she would clash, and Cornell law student Robert Gottlieb (Lucas Hedges), her admiring former intern, as youth coordinator, a strategic part of the campaign given that the 1972 presidential election was the first after the voting age was lowered to 18.

Also significant is Shirley’s meeting with Barbara Lee (Christina Jackson), a 25-year-old single mother who believes registering to vote is futile given that politics doesn’t exist for Black women. Hired to work on the campaign, Barbara becomes Shirley’s protégée, steered on a path that would make her an enduring force in the Democratic Party. Barbara is one of the earliest advocates for going after California.

Vowing to “give politics back to the people” and promoting herself as a catalyst for change, Shirley becomes a persuasive orator, winning over skeptics but also encountering ugly racism. That includes an assassination attempt that leaves her badly shaken and perhaps drives her unpopular decision to pay a hospital visit to segregationist Alabama governor and rival candidate George Wallace (W. Earl Brown) after he is paralyzed by gunshot wounds in an attempt on his life.