The reason why Dr Dre was concerned about the ‘Straight Outta Compton’ movie
Straight Outta Compton, the 2015 biopic telling the rise and fall of NWA, was by any reasonable measure a success. Critically acclaimed, Oscar-nominated, and high-grossing at the box office, the project, to put it lightly, went very well. But, during its making, Dr Dre wasn’t so sure that things were going to work out.
In the run-up to the film’s release, Dre was on the promo circuit drumming up interest, which, in March 2015, led him to appear on Big Boy’s radio show. He spoke fondly of the project, claiming that it aimed to reveal the “heart” of NWA’s members and to depict “everything we went through” before the group fell apart.
But even though he was painting the project in a good light, he did admit to the doubts he once harboured about it. He conceded that he’d once been “nervous” about the film, because he feared it could place a “blemish on our legacy”.
“The story had to be told right,” he insisted, “And it’s incredible, man. I’m really excited about it”.
Dre acknowledged that the production team had experienced their “ups and downs” during filming, which is putting it mildly. Reports that have since emerged about the shoot have painted scenes of complete chaos.
A costume designer who worked on the production, for instance, once told Film Doctor that the film’s script changed “the entire time”, which made it very difficult for those working on set to keep up with what was going on. But, as bad as that was, it wasn’t as troubling as the violence that occurred.
A drive-by shooting took place during production, with one person unaffiliated with the film being hit, while Dre’s old business partner, Suge Knight, killed someone in a hit-and-run incident that ultimately sent him to jail on a 28-year sentence. It also emerged later that he’d allegedly threatened the film’s director, F Gary Gray, because of his perception that he was being portrayed negatively in the movie.
To describe incidents such as these as “ups and downs”, as Dre did, is underplaying the level of chaos that occurred during the making of Straight Outta Compton, but filming did, in the end, get done, and Dre was very pleased with the result, as he insisted to Big Boy. He claimed that everybody was going to appreciate the film when it was released, “especially everybody from Los Angeles”.
Dre’s optimism proved justified, as despite all its problems during production, the completed film was well reviewed, was a box office success, and picked up an Academy Award nomination for ‘Best Original Screenplay’.