Landon Buford
Last week, Snoop Dogg was on Clubhouse in Behind The Vest in Druski’s room. Snoop Dogg talked about numerous topics when someone asked how his role as Rodney in Baby Boy came up during the conversation.
“John Singleton was a dear friend of mine. But, believe it or not, Tupac was supposed to Jody. So, it was supposed to be a me and Tupac movie, and when he got to the point where he picked Tyrese.
“He still had me in mind, and then when told me he was doing it, he’s like I still got that role for you, but it’s going to be with Tyrese you still down? I’m like hell yeah I’m down, what I gotta do? He’s like you going to the worst nigga on screen, but they will love you. I’m like f*** it lets go. We put that s***; I said my hair had to be a certain way. I need my s*** because my character is this and I think I can make it more believable. He enabled me to add my spices to it and we did that and that’s a classic movie R.I.P. John Singleton.”
Like Snoop Dogg said, Baby Boy is a classic even without the late, great Tupac and Tyrese killed the role as Jody.
During a 2020 interview with Fat Joe, Tyrese mentioned Pac was shooting the video ‘To Live and Die in L.A’ in Los Angeles, which was not too far from Singleton’s office.
“He walked up to Pac in the middle of the video shoot and said, ‘I wrote a movie for you’,” said Tyrese to Fat Joe. Tyrese cited how Tupac—like Jody—was raised by a single mom before adding Singleton told Tupac, “I’ve got the perfect movie to tell your story.”
Tyrese added, Singleton was so devastated by Tupac’s death that he put Baby Boy on hold.
“And then he ran into me and said, ‘You remind me of Pac.’ The way we laugh, we’re opinionated, we’re alpha, we’re studied.” Tyrese said Singleton changed his mind once he saw him.
The Transformer actor went on to say that initially, he refused the role numerous times because he wasn’t ready. Although he wanted to continue his musical career, Singleton was persistent.
