Notorious: Was B.I.G really that influential to deserve a biopic?

Fanon Hutchinson

"The most important film of our time" goes the tagline for the new biopic "Notorious” which is the story of the life and death of slain rapper Notorious B.I.G. aka "Biggie Smalls." Really? This is a more important film than Malcolm X? And it’s more important than the films about Martin Luther King or films such as "Cry Freedom" or "The Great Debaters?" I don't even think it’s the most important Hip Hop movie. What about Krush Groove or Beat Street?

I’ve loved hip hop since I first heard "Rock Box" by Run-DMC in the early 80's. From the era of Run-DMC, Kurtis Blow, the Sugarhill Gang, the Whodini, Fat Boys, LL Cool J, the Beastie Boys in the mid-80's. In the late 1980s it was the EPMD, Boogie Down Productions, Eric B. & Rakim, Public Enemy, NWA, the Tribe Called Quest, De la Soul, Queen Latifah, Compton's Most Wanted, and Dr. Dre. They are the legitimate pioneers of rap and hip hop.
Now granted, I can't stomach much of what passes as Hip-Hop nowadays as it seems like it’s geared more towards a segment of the population that wear "skinny jeans" and Mohawk hair styles. In other words most of the stuff nowadays is more for little kids and adolescents.
This brings me back to “Notorious.” His entire career can be confined to two albums. TWO ALBUMS! The first album was "Ready to Die." This album is labeled as a classic but I would have to disagree. Can you really compare it to Public Enemy's "It takes A Nation of Millions." or to Ice Cube’s "Death Certificate" or a Tribe Called Quest’s "Low End Theory?"

These albums defined a generation and helped to revolutionize the way Hip-Hop was viewed. These albums made you think as well as made you move. While all three of these albums are as different as Obama is to Ronald Reagan they are lyrically and musically on point. "Ready to Die" is mostly filled with the usual tales of hustling, sex, standard rap braggadocio and party songs. It is no different than anything that has come before it. The only thing that set this album apart is the beats, which deviated from the mid 90's grimy east coast sound which permeates throughout the albums of such New York artists as Wu-Tang Clan, Black Moon, and Onyx. But this is more attributed to P Diddy and his Hitmen production team and not Biggie himself.

Biggie's first album did showcase a sort of hard-luck case who was able to pull himself up out of a bad situation and become a winner. This could have been inspirational to a lot of people but the whole rags to riches story was nothing new or innovative and neither was the whole "I had to sell drugs to feed my daughter" song and dance which was supposed to make his actions seem honorable without any remorse on his part. At least, when NWA or Ice T. told a tale of drug hustling there was some kind of repercussions within the song. On Biggie’s second album "Life after Death" the content remained the same as the first album except now the tone was less bleak now that he had made it. There were less hard luck songs and more "lets party, drink champagne, and bone random chicks" songs. He even had the good sense to include a how-to song on the rules of selling drugs (the Ten Crack Commandments. This is just what black youth need). However there are a few notable songs contained on "Life after Death" such as "Notorious Thugs" which pairs Biggie with the rapid fire delivery of Cleveland rap quartet Bone Thugs & Harmony and even showcases Biggie impressively going toe to toe with the nimble tongued Bone group.

I don't think that Biggie is without talent. On the contrary I think he is a very talented wordsmith. But to label him as "the greatest rapper of all-time" as a lot of people has done is a slap in the face to all the great emcees that came before and after him who have had more of an impact in the development and evolution of Hip-Hop. What about Krs-One, Big Daddy Kane, Ice Cube, or the man who I think should be in everybody's top-five, a person who revolutionized Hip-Hop music, and in my opinion truly took rap to a new level, that’s Rakim. When are their movies coming out about their lives? That’s not a notorious question.

Fanon Hutchinson is the editor and publisher of a Los Angeles based hip hop and sports blog http://bighutchbaby.blogspot.com

Remembering the Other Eartha Kitt

Earl Ofari Hutchinson


The smile on Eartha Kitt’s face was unforgettable. It belied the pain, ridicule and turmoil that she had endured after she was unceremoniously shoved at or near the top of then President Lyndon Johnson’s enemies list. But that seemed to be the furthest thing from her mind that late spring afternoon in 1978 when she greeted me at the old Aquarius Theater in Hollywood. Kitt was in Los Angeles starring in her tour production of the musical Timbuktu. I was assigned to do a brief interview and a review of the production.

Kitt’s smile and infectious energy melted the awe and nervousness that I felt at being up close too and actually talking with an entertainment legend. Then there was the “incident.” That was the furor that Kitt ignited when she denounced the Vietnam War and poverty to Johnson at that White House luncheon in January, 1968. A decade later the controversy still got the tongues wagging.

Her performance in Los Angeles was in part Kitt’s American scene entertainment rehabilitation after being virtually banned in the U.S. after her Johnson White House outburst. Her performance was also in part a brash effort to reclaim the luster that had made her virtually a household name and an icon in the entertainment world in the 1950s and early 1960s. By then Kitt had firmly established her legacy as an award winning internationally acclaimed singer, dancer, film, stage and TV actress. Kitt was tagged as sultry, sensual, and sexual alluring. But that was the surface stuff. Kitt’s brash, sassy, and high energy style and persona sent the clear message that she was her own woman. She refused to be relegated to the stereotypical stage and film roles, and turned her sensuality into a badge of fierce independence and pride, the trademark of defiance. Kitt’s pioneer independence and sense of self influenced the coming generation of young female entertainers and personalities from Oprah to Beyonce to Madonna. They owe her a debt of gratitude.

But even that side of Kitt obscured the Kitt who was passionately devoted to and supported peace and civil rights causes. The clash with Johnson, really the Johnson’s, Lyndon and Lady Bird Johnson, at the celebrity women’s luncheon in January 1968 gave the first public hint of that.

Lady Bird Johnson had invited Kitt to the luncheon and in an innocent moment asked Kitt what she thought about the problems of inner city youth. Kitt didn’t mince words and lambasted the Johnson administration for not doing more about poverty, joblessness, and drugs in black communities. Kitt didn’t stop there, she tied her outburst directly into an attack on the Vietnam War, a war she said was without reason or explanation. Kitt’s verbal assault on the war and racial problems made headline news. A badly shaken first lady and an enraged LBJ denounced her. The next few years she was hounded and harassed by the FBI, the IRS and Secret Service agents. The CIA even compiled a gossipy, intrusive dossier on her that attempted to paint her as a sex starved malcontent. The public storm and the negative press proved too much.

Kitt’s career was effectively dead in the United States. But she stuck by her guns and did not apologize, retract or soften her criticism of Johnson’s war and racial policies. Kitt in fact hadn’t said anything at that luncheon that thousands of others hadn’t said about Johnson’s hopelessly failed, flawed and losing war and racial problems. The difference was who said it; namely a celebrated star, and where it was said at the White House. Kitt took the heat and paid the price for giving an honest opinion and her deep felt belief about the cause of peace and social justice. She was branded as a racial agitator.

Missed in the overreaching hysteria and the vindictive bashing was that underneath the glitter and carefully crafted sexpot image, Kitt had given time and money to the NAACP and other civil rights organizations. She supported and participated in the March on Washington. During her wilderness years when she was forced to work outside the U.S. she took heat for performing before all white audiences in South Africa. But like so much about Kitt that went unnoticed, she broke barriers by insisting that her cast was integrated. She also quietly raised money for black schools in the country.

During our brief talk before her stage performance in Los Angeles, Kitt spent as much time talking about her devotion to the civil rights movement and the injustice of apartheid in South Africa, than about the production she was in. She did not mince words when I gingerly asked her about the “incident.” She laughed but did not express any regret about what she said and did that day at the White House. She expressed no bitterness about the years of media and public ostracism.

This is the Eartha Kitt, the impassioned contributor to peace and civil rights, that I knew, remember, and pay homage to.

C'est si bon"

Earl Ofari Hutchinson is an author and political analyst. His forthcoming book is How Obama Won (Middle Passage Press, January 2009).