Fox Searchlight has found its big-screen Biggie.
The specialty division has announced that Jamal Woolard, a Brooklyn-based rapper, will be cast in the role of the late rap icon Biggie Smalls, aka the Notorious B.I.G., in its upcoming biopic Notorious.
Derek Luke, Angela Bassett and Anthony Mackie also have been cast in the movie, Searchlight said. Luke will play Biggie record producer Sean Diddy Combs, who offscreen is an exec producer on the film. Mackie will play rival rapper Tupac Shakur, while Bassett will play Biggie's mother Voletta Wallace.
The production held an open casting call in the fall in the hope of finding the next Notorious B.I.G., nee Christopher Wallace, the generously built East Coast rapper who was killed in an Los Angeles drive-by in 1997.
The idea, execs said, was that as with casting for sports movies like Miracle, the production would be better served with a nonactor who can rap and imitate Biggie than with a pro actor who might need to be taught how to rap.
The specialty division has announced that Jamal Woolard, a Brooklyn-based rapper, will be cast in the role of the late rap icon Biggie Smalls, aka the Notorious B.I.G., in its upcoming biopic Notorious.
Derek Luke, Angela Bassett and Anthony Mackie also have been cast in the movie, Searchlight said. Luke will play Biggie record producer Sean Diddy Combs, who offscreen is an exec producer on the film. Mackie will play rival rapper Tupac Shakur, while Bassett will play Biggie's mother Voletta Wallace.
The production held an open casting call in the fall in the hope of finding the next Notorious B.I.G., nee Christopher Wallace, the generously built East Coast rapper who was killed in an Los Angeles drive-by in 1997.
The idea, execs said, was that as with casting for sports movies like Miracle, the production would be better served with a nonactor who can rap and imitate Biggie than with a pro actor who might need to be taught how to rap.
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