Music, performances hit right notes in ‘The New Edition’ biopic.

In the end, there was always the music.

Music, the element that lifts BET’s “The New Edition Story” above the revisionism of the standard showbiz biopic that it is.

The miniseries, launching 8 p.m. Tuesday, follows five boys from the Orchard Park housing projects in Boston’s Roxbury neighborhood, through super-stardom as New Edition, through a host of internal problems and to their unimpeachable status as one of the great R&B boy bands of the 20th century.

New Edition was formed in 1978 by five boys who were inspired by the Jackson 5 and others. They loved music, had a great sense of musical style and saw instant stardom as a way out of a life with limited options.

In other words, they were ripe for exploitation, which they found, along with success. The original members — Bobby Brown, Ricky Bell, Ralph Tresvant, Michael Bivins and Ronnie DeVoe — were signed by local manager Brooke Payne (Wood Harris) who guided them in the early phase of their career. And once they were successful, they were even more ripe for exploitation. Their mothers essentially ran their careers, but the boys themselves signed the contracts.

Hit records, sold-out concert tours, worldwide fame only made the spotlight shine brighter. But, in a story we’ve heard before, their fame didn’t quite equate with them seeing a lot of money. Their new manager, Gary Evans (Michael Rapaport), all but oozes phoniness as he first promises they’ll be huge stars and later explains that if they’d read their contracts, they would have seen they were virtually indentured servants to their record label. And to Evans as well, of course.

Let me pause here to point out that if Rapaport is playing your agent, keep your hand on your wallet at all times: The versatile character actor is especially good at playing bad.

The rest of the story you probably know from tabloid headlines — because that’s where Brown took the tale after his marriage to Whitney Houston — and various legal and drug problems.

The miniseries was developed by Jesse Collins, written by Abdul Williams and directed by Chris Robinson, with all five original New Edition members and Johnny Gill, who joined the group in 1987, serving as producers.

The six-hour, threenight miniseries includes the fist-fights, drug use, temper tantrums, breakups, reunions and scandals that really happened to the group over its 30 years, but so little time is spent with these events, they seem like spats or minor transgressions.

We do see Brown getting arrested. And the filmmakers have included Houston (Ashley Wade) and Bobbi-Kristina, but they are seen in the background, with their faces turned away from the camera.

The performances and the musical numbers are more than just the mortar between superficially sketched moments of history: They’re the reason the miniseries is great fun to watch.

The actors playing the original New Edition members as kids are so good, you almost don’t want their characters to grow up. The talented quintet includes Caleb McLaughlin as Bell, Myles Truitt as DeVoe, Jahi Di’Allo Winston as Tresvant, Tyler Marcel Williams as Brown and Dante Hoagland as Bivins.

Their grown-up replacements are equally fine: Bryshere Y. Gray as Bivins, Elijah Kelley as Bell, Keith Powers as DeVoe, Algee Smith as Tresvant and McClain as Brown. Luke James does a fine turn as Gill, as well.

As good as the cast is, the music is even better, with many of the group’s most memorable hits celebrated in exquisitely choreographed and costumed performances.

We may easily suspend disbelief here, as with any showbiz biography, because that’s the nature of the subgenre. Nobody tunes in to this kind of project expecting a wealth of accuracy, depth or detail. With “The New Edition Story,” you tune in for the music, just as you’ve done for more than three decades.