Director Steve McQueen To Helm Official Tupac Documentary
Coming on the heels of the highly anticipated Tupac biopic All Eyez On Me set for release next month, the Tupac estate has announced a new authorized documentary on the life of Tupac Shakur.
Amaru Entertainment (the company established by Tupac’s mother Afeni Shakur) has officially sanctioned the new film, which will be directed by Steve McQueen, the Oscar-winning director behind 12 Years A Slave.
“I am extremely moved and excited to be exploring the life and times of this legendary artist”, McQueen said in a statement. “I attended NYU film school in 1993 and can remember the unfolding hip-hop world and mine overlapping with Tupac’s through a mutual friend in a small way. Few, if any shined brighter than Tupac Shakur. I look forward to working closely with his family to tell the unvarnished story of this talented man”.
The rest of the team behind the forthcoming doc is shaping up to be some veterans in the music documentary world including producer Jayson Jackson (What Happened, Miss Simone?), Nigel Sinclair (The Beatles: Eight Days a Week), Nicholas Ferrall, and Shakur Estate trustee Tom Whalley. In addition to Shakur’s estate, the film will also have the support of Interscope Records and Universal Music Publishing Group.
The Tupac feature film, All Eyez On Me is officially slated for a 16 June release, the day that would have been Tupac’s 46th birthday. Meanwhile, watch an exclusive clip of the film that aired during the MTV Movie Awards on 7 May that features Tupac (played by Demetrius Shipp Jr) reading a poem to Jada Pinkett Smith (played by Kat Graham), before moving out to California to pursue his music dreams. The reading comes from the poem ‘Jada’, which was later featured in 2Pac’s 1999 posthumous book, The Rose That Grew from Concrete. While the film experienced its share of temporary setbacks during production, it’s set for wide theatrical release this summer.
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