Actress-model Yaya DaCosta—who Lifetime fans will recognize from her performance as music icon Whitney Houston in the network's 2015 biopic Whitney—leads the channel's latest “Ripped from the Headlines” movie, Not My Family: The Monique Smith Story, which premieres tonight, April 12, at 8pm Eastern Time.
Based on a shocking true story, Not My Family: The Monique Smith Story chronicles the horrific childhood of Baltimore woman Monique Smith (played by DaCosta)—who is forced to endure years of abuse at the hands of her own family—and what happens when Monique later discovers that the people she thought were her own kin actually aren't related to her at all.
"From a young age, Monique always felt out of place in her family. Living in constant fear of abuse from her mother and others, she dreamed of finding people who loved her and a place that truly felt like a home," reads the official synopsis of the true-crime drama, per Lifetime. "Because of the abuse she suffered, she felt she could never embrace her family and especially wanted to know her origin story once she became a mother herself. After realizing she didn’t have proper documentation, including a birth certificate or social security card, she goes on a decades-long search to discover who she really is. "
