Legendary Hip-Hop filmmaker and director Allen Hughes’ five-part documentary series on Tupac Shakur and his mother Afeni Shakur is slated to premiere on April 21st 2023. Reportedly, the documentary, originally titled ‘Outlaw’, will portray Afeni Shakur’s profound impact on the West Coast Hip-Hop pioneer‘s rap music and her far-reaching social activism in the U.S. at the time.
Produced by FX Networks, the “deeply personal” five-part series “defies the conventions of traditional documentary storytelling to share an illuminating saga of mother and son, Afeni and Tupac Shakur. Their story chronicles the possibilities and contradictions of the U.S. from a time of revolutionary fervour to Hip Hop culture’s most ostentatious decade.”
Hughes, who is also filming a riveting documentary on Snoop Dogg – another historic figure in West Coast Gangsta Rap, is behind electrifying motion pictures including Samuel L. Jackson starrer ‘Menace II Society’, ‘Dead Presidents’, ‘American Pimp’ and most recently ‘The Defiant Ones’.
Last year, Allen Hughes spoke at length about the ‘Dear Mama’ documentary series with Deadline. “We’ve all heard about the way Tupac tragically died, but what we don’t know was what he was born into. That there was an expectation from the Black Panther Party and his family. They had an expectation. What does that trauma mean?” Hughes said at the time.
In December, Tupac Shakur’s stepfather returned home after 35 years. Recognised for leading the revolution against African-American racism and advocating for black civil rights, Mutulu Shakur was sentenced to sixty years in imprisonment after he led a group of revolutionaries in a string of armed robberies across New York and Connecticut in 1988.
Watch the Allen Hughes-directed ‘Dear Mama: The Saga of Afeni & Tupac Shakur’ trailer here.
Listen to ‘Dear Mama’ by Tupac Shakur here if you haven’t yet.
