In 1994, Tupac Shakur sat down with Entertainment Weekly’s Benjamin Svetkey and shared his uncut feelings on life, death, success, trouble with the law and the media. Looking to bring his passionate words to life, PBS Digital Studios’ set the audio recording to animated drawings in their latest Blank On Blank segment.
“If I was white I would have been like John Wayne. Somebody who pulled himself up from their bootstraps. From poverty. From welfare. Now I am kissing Janet Jackson. I’m doing movies. I feel like a tragic hero in a Shakespeare play, you know what I’m saying?”
Everybody wants to use me. Everybody. From this level to the street level. I mean I’m used on every level. I have no friends. I have no resting place. I never sleep. I can never close my eyes. It’s horrible.
Can you imagine what it’s like for you to be who I am, who I was, and for them to say that I raped a woman? And for the whole world to actually be entertaining the thought that you raped a woman. That’s hell.
I would die in jail. And that’s what they want. They want me to go through all of that. Then come out. But I’m already dead. No creativity. I’m finished.
