*The new documentary “Whitney” highlights the role Bobby Brown played in the life of the late superstar Whitney Houston.
The R&B icon, who was married to Houston from 1992 to 2007, was one of more than 60 people interviewed by the film’s director Kevin Macdonald. But Brown refused to discuss on camera his and Whitney’s long history of drug abuse during their marriage.
In this week’s PEOPLE issue, Houston’s family and friends open up about the ups and downs of the rocky marriage.
“I just hope people remember Whitney for the music she shared with the world, which was her most important legacy,” Brown tells the publication.
“Part of me felt like she got married to please people. Just to get off of the market so people would stop questioning her,” says Houston’s hairstylist and close friend Ellin LaVar, who says that at the time Houston met Brown, the star was tired of dodging rumors about her romance with Robyn Crawford.
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According to the doc, Brown’s bad-boy persona intrigued Houston.
“We from the hood. And Bobby was a black boy from the hood. He was the type my mother always kept away from her,” Whitney’s brother Michael says in the film.
But many say Brown often felt overshadowed by his ex-wife success and there were problems from the start.
“Bobby Brown was like a child when he got there, ill-equipped to get married to Whitney Houston and walk into that environment,” says Houston’s longtime agent and “Whitney” executive producer Nicole David. “All these people had collaborated together with her to create who she had become.”
Houston reportedly began using drugs long before she ever met Brown.
“Let’s just say Bobby was f—ing lightweight when it came to motherf—ing drugs,” her brother Michael reveals in the documentary. During the relationship, their habits only increased.
“The problem with Whitney and Bobby was they exacerbated each other’s addiction,” says LaVar. “She did more cocaine, he drank more. But when they got together they both started doing more cocaine and drinking. It just manifested itself in a really bad way.”
Some say Brown was at times envious of his wife’s success.
“Bobby was jealous and he couldn’t recognize that emotion,” Donna Houston, Whitney’s former sister-in-law says in the film. “For him, in a black man’s mind, it was tearing him up.”
But at the core of their issues, says LaVar, was their individual battles to get sober.
“They both didn’t go into rehab at the same time,” she says. “That whole concept of sobriety was an issue for both of them.”
The star’s friends and family deny that Brown was the root of her troubles, but “he was of no assistance,” says David.
Whitney Houston died on Feb. 11, 2012.
Today marks the 26th anniversary of Bobby and Whitney’s wedding.
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