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Film
50 Cent: On Getting Rich and Almost Dyin' Tryin'
posted on Nov 7, 2005
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| Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson stars in Paramount Pictures' "Get Rich or Die Tryin'," based loosely on his life story. |
The rags-to-riches story of Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson, aka "Fiddy," gets big screen treatment this Wednesday (Nov 9) when Paramount Pictures' "Get Rich of Die Tryin'" opens at movie theatres nationwide. Famous for having been shot nine times and survived, the story surrounding 50's rapid rise to superstardom is full of pop folklore. Now the real story is being told. "I guess you could say that 'Get Rich or Die Tryin" is a collage of my life," offers 50 who says the film is about 75 percent factual. "It's not so much my life story, as it is a story that has incidents similar to some that happened in my life."
"Get Rich or Die Tryin'" is the story of an orphaned street kid (Marcus) who makes his mark in the drug trade but finally dares to leave the violence behind and become the rap artist he was meant to be. Born and raised in Queens, New York without a father, his mother died before he hit his teens. He was taken in by his grandparents, but his desire for things took him to the street where he amassed a small fortune and a lengthy rap sheet. The birth of a son put things in perspective, and Marcus (50) began to pursue rap seriously.
In April 2000, 50 was shot 9 times, including a 9mm bullet to his face, in front of his grandmother's house in Queens. He spent the next few months in recovery and continued to pursue his rap career. With the help of his friend Sha Money XL, 50 released a series of independent G-unit mix tapes that created a buzz on the street. The CD caught the ear of Eminem and Dr. Dre, who signed the rapper to a million-dollar record deal in 2002 under their Shady/Aftermath imprint. Hip-hop history was made.
50 Cent's debut album, "Get Rich or Die Tryin'," set the mark for the all-time best debut with 900,000 units sold in the first week. The album went on to be certified six times platinum. With his 2005 follow up, "The Massacre," 50 Cent became the first artist to have four songs in the top ten of Billboard's Hot 100 since the Beatles in 1964. The album debuted at No. 1 and has sold more than 4 million units to date.
Six-time OscarÆ nominee Jim Sheridan ("My Left Foot," "In America") directs "Get Rich or Die Tryin'" from a script by Terrence Winter, a two-time Emmy winner for "The Sopranos."
At the Essex House Hotel in NYC, 50 Cent talked about his feature film acting debut and what it was like to live the gangsta life.
Q: Do you think your life story the exception or the rule for rap artists? I mean, is this a portrait of what your average rapper goes through life to make it? Or where they come from?
50: Absolutely not. My situation was different. I hope everyone isn't experiencing the same thing. For me, music has been a way out. Actually my son is like in the film… well I wasn't actually incarcerated when he came. So that's where the fictional point comes into the play, It became a priority in my life because I didn't have only myself as a responsibility I had to change things in order to provide for him so I started writing music fulltime.
Q: Your grandparents in the film, and I assume in real life, seemed to be a positive force in your life. Why did you make the choices you did?
50: My grandparents are just like they are in the film. They tried to provide for me. My mom, because she wasn't around physically a lot, she substituted it with financial support. She gave me a lot of nice things and when she passed, my grandparents tried to cater to me a little bit, but they had eight other kids. I didn't want to ask them for things so I asked the people who appeared to have it with no problem and those were all people from my mother's life. They had nice jewelry, nice cars and in their eyes, they were doing me a favor to allow me to hustle at such an early age.
Q: How do you respond to people who will say this movie glamorizes the gangsta rapper lifestyle?
50: I just think for a person who assumes that it's glamorizing the life, it's obvious that, that person hasn't experienced anything that they are looking at. At least it will give them the opportunity to see what goes on in other places. Like Eminem's "8 Mile" opened my eyes up to life in a trailer park. That's the middle America ghetto. People make comparisons to my film to "8 Mile" because me and Em had success in music prior to going into and making the films and the biggest similarities that they overlook is that neither one of us had good relationships with our fathers. They point to the music instead of the fact that we didn't have fathers.
Q: In the movie you broke it down to how many hours you have to actually sell drugs just to make minimum wage. Was that your idea to deglamorize the life?
50: Absolutely and it's the honest truth because if you think about it… if you work a 9 to 5, a hustler can make that kind of money in a few hours, but they never develop a credit history. Over time the guy working the 9 to 5 is in a better position financially because the guy out there doing the wrong thing. Even if he makes more money, he ends up spending it on lawyer's fees and bail and what not.
Q: Can you talk about working with Jim Sheridan? Did you ever think that he wouldn't understand where you are coming from?
50: No, because before we actually got started, we were in Los Angeles and I spent time talking with Jim and I realized that he understood a lot more than people knew. Jim asked me to sit down and talk to him to make sure he was on point. He watched the same movies that I was watching -- any movie that would be a reference to what it was like to live in New York City or the ghetto. He said none of them kinda had a theme that was universal- the actual family life- a family story. So we went towards the actual situations that caused the behavior instead of the actual behavior.
Q: How long were you in the hospital after you got shot?
50: I was in the hospital for 13 days and then I was moved to the Pocono's. It was about nine months before I was back. A portion of the bullet came out of the back of my gums. They didn't bother with my tongue because they felt like they would do more nerve damage. One of them started coming back out in the gland at first I though it was tooth.
Q: Do you have any regrets?
50: I've made mistakes in my life. Everyone has made mistakes in life, but I feel like the things you go through make you who they are. I needed the experience of making that mistake to make me who I am right now.
Q: Do you wish your mom could see what has happened to you right now?
50: I would trade everything I have right now for my mother and that relationship.
Q: Do you feel vulnerable putting your life so out there in terms of your music and now with this film? Or are you just happy that everyone knows what you want them to know?
50: I'm just happy that people out there get a chance to see it. It's an opportunity for me to expand my base. You know people don't see hip hop as an art form. There are so many people who probably wouldn't want to see a movie based on my life because they have heard from so many media outlets pieces of my life, but I hope they will want to see more about my life.
Q: What do you want people to come away with when they see your life story?
50: I hope at the end of the day they come away with a greater sense of who I am and where I came from and why I made the some of the choices I've made.
Q: So, you're living the American dream?
50: Is this the America Dream? [50 chuckles]
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