Toni Braxton’s Autistic Son Appears in Lifetime Movie

Toni Braxton’s new Lifetime movie, Twist of Fate, marks a special milestone for the singer/actress–she will get to share screen time with her son.
“He was supposed to play my son initially but by the time we worked out the shooting schedule, school had started,” Braxton said of 9-year-old Diezel, who has autism. Braxton’s autistic son has made her an advocate for the organization Autism Speaks, which spreads awareness and understanding about the disorder.
“Even though he’s considered high functioning right now, he wasn’t in the past, and that’s why I thought him carrying the movie and trying to do the movie and tutoring would have been too much for him,” Braxton, 45, said.
Yet, Braxton insists she and Diezel are happy with the outcome of his smaller role in Twist of Fate.
With all the attention on her new Lifetime movie, Toni says she is not jumping to get back to music. “I don’t know if I’m going to be doing anymore music, I’ve said that before in the past but I don’t know,” she said to The Tom Joyner Morning Show.
“I’m thinking, I’m singing in the movie. Ta-Da. Some gospel a little bit. I just don’t know. Maybe I’m mad at music. I don’t know what it is. I can’t, my heart’s not in it right now,” she admitted.
Yet, Braxton was quick to say she will likely return to music at some point in the future. She has largely been derailed from her music career (which peaked in the 1990s with songs like “Unbreak my Heart” and “He Wasn’t Man Enough”) by a series of financial woes and health scares that included dangerous blood clots.
“My doctors told me I would never be able to perform again,” she said. “I’m very lucky that I’m still able to dabble in it a little bit.”
Twist of Fate debuts Saturday on Lifetime (8 p.m. ET).