Tupac's Final Film “Gang Related”

Original: “Tupac’s Last Movie Coming Soon” · MTV News (The Week in Rock) · Kurt Loder (anchor) · September 26, 1997

Tupac might be entering his second year “in the past tense,” but he was still selling, and he was still talking. With those words, MTV anchor Kurt Loder announced Tupac’s final film on The Week in Rock in September 1997: the crime drama Gang Related. The studio MGM had sent out a press kit for it that included one of Tupac’s last filmed interviews. It was recorded in August 1996; MTV dates the conversation to August 30.

Loder struck a notable note in his introduction: “Tupac’s rap talent was sometimes disputed, but not his natural charisma as a screen actor.” The network then showed excerpts in which Tupac speaks about honesty in acting, quotes that are contextualized in more detail on the page covering MTV’s companion news report.

The MTV segment closed with music. As with Gridlock’d, there would be a soundtrack from Death Row, for which Tupac had written several songs. In the interview, he sings the hook to Fortune and Fame and explains what it is about: everyone wants to be famous, “noticed and watched,” from gang members to police officers.

A Corrupt Cop and Empty Theaters

Gang Related was written and directed by Jim Kouf. Tupac plays a corrupt cop alongside Jim Belushi; the cast also includes Lela Rochon and Dennis Quaid. Loder gave the release date as October 8, while MTV’s news report from the same day stated October 10. Box Office Mojo lists October 10, 1997 as the US theatrical release. The film was not a success: it grossed around $2.4 million on its opening weekend and just under $5.9 million overall.

Double Platinum and a Missing Song

The music fared significantly better. Gang Related, The Soundtrack was released by Death Row/Priority and debuted at No. 2 on the album charts in the October 25, 1997 issue of Billboard; Billboard now lists it as double Platinum. Tupac is featured on four of its tracks.

Fortune and Fame, which he sang in the interview, is not among them, the song was not on any official track list of the soundtrack. On the posthumous album Better Dayz (2002), a track titled Fame featuring the Outlawz was released; whether it traces back to the same recording is unconfirmed. The preview in the interview thus remains primarily a record of what Tupac was working on in the summer of 1996.

Read more

• Tupac on his goals as an actor
• The Gridlock’d soundtrack tops the chart
• More than 150 unreleased songs