‘Straight Outta Compton’ is going straight into the history books after adding yet another shining achievement to its already long list of nods. As fans know, the movie – released in August 2015 – set a number of records its first weekend including:
- Highest opening weekend for a musical biopic ($60 million)
- Highest August opening weekend for an R-rated film
Fast forward three months and $200 million later, the NWA biographical film now boasts two new records: highest grossing musical biopic of all time and highest grossing film by a black director (F. Gary Gray). But, while the legendary rap group may be lifting a glass to celebrate the accomplishments, there’s one who isn’t exactly thrilled at the news: their former manager Jerry Heller…
As we reported here, Heller sued NBC Universal, Legendary Pictures, Comptown Records. In a recent sitdown with Rolling Stone, the 75-year-old explained about the ‘inaccuracies’ spotted in the film:
On Eazy E firing him:
“I was with him until the day of his untimely death. I still think about him every day. He was like my son. He was a visionary. He was the greatest, and I’ve always believed that only he and I really understood the significance of what N.W.A was. The rest of the guys were like, ‘Hey, we’re going to be a big group, and we’re going to make money.’”
On Ice Cube’s accusation he was never paid while in the group:
“The deal was structured so that Ruthless got a little off the top, and the band split the rest equally,” he said. “So they split $375,000 five ways, which is $75,000 a piece. That was an astronomical amount of money, and everybody signed their contracts except for Ice Cube.”
On his lack of input on how he was portrayed in the film:
“Nobody reached out to me. I didn’t know what was in the movie,” he said. “They knew what was in the movie. I didn’t, until I saw it on the screen. Nobody from their camp ever reached out to me once to talk about, “Are you going to like this?” or anything else. I thought that was disrespectful. If that’s the way they choose to do business, then that’s why there’s a lawsuit now.”
…it’s just trying to make me look bad. That’s all.”
Sounds like Pebbles to me.
Exactly!
Shady Ass Men.
Ice Cube knew you were a T girl!!!!!
But congrats to all the success !
Tupac biopic next! This movie needs to be done by the same director!
Who leaked Adele’s 25 ?