The Notorious IGN
Thursday, December 4th, 2008
The folks over at IGN share their knowledge on the upcoming B.I.G. biopic, “Notorious”.
Long before prolific rapper The Notorious B.I.G. was shot in a still unsolved 1997 drive-by, he was growing up on the streets of Brooklyn’s Bed-Sty neighborhood, making his way as a hustler. Biggie, born Christopher Wallace, was the only son of his single mother. He began dealing drugs at the age of 12 and became further involved in a life of crime after dropping out of high school at age 17.
Biggie’s rap career took off when he was discovered by record producer extraordinaire Sean (now “Diddy” then “Puffy”) Combs.
The early 1990s saw Biggie take the hip-hop world by storm — his 1994 debut Ready to Die hit #13 on the Billboard chart and ultimately went quadruple Platinum. B.I.G. is often credited as the savior of East Coast rap as the album was released at a time when the scene was being almost entirely dominated by West Coast rappers. But this success resulted in B.I.G. becoming further embroiled in the highly publicized bi-coastal rap rivalry.
Things became especially contentious between Biggie and former colleague Tupac Shakur. But the lives of both rap stars would come to tragic ends within six months of each other. Shakur was killed in a drive-by in September 1996, and B.I.G. was similarly murdered on March 9, 1997.
In death, Biggie continued to be a best-selling artist — the diamond-certified Life After Death was released just 15 days after his passing — and has come to be regarded as a cultural icon for his influence on the hip-hop world.
It’s no wonder then that Hollywood is rushing to tell Wallace’s story in Notorious. The Fox Searchlight flick won’t hit theaters until January 16, but we’ll break it down for you right now.
Here’s the 411 on Notorious…
Click on the link below to get the scoop:
You can purchase the Notorious movie posters from All Movie Replicas.
