How We Met Tupac’s Mother
The co-director of the late rapper’s early music videos revisits his family ties in FX’S five-part series
The five-part docuseries “Dear Mama” uses Tupac’s 1995 hit — an autobiographical track that pays tribute to his mother Afeni Shakur — as its thesis statement.
In the song, Tupac details the highs and lows of their relationship — from poverty and Afeni’s addiction to crack cocaine, to his admiration for her work as a leader of the Black Panther Party in the 1970s and her dedication as a mother. Likewise, the FX docuseries juxtaposes the rapper’s rise to become one of hip-hop’s most influential artists with his mother’s activism.
“Dear Mama” reveals the circumstances that led to some of Tupac’s most famous tracks, including “Keep Ya Head Up,” “How Do U Want It” and “California Love,” as well as “Trapped” and “Brenda’s Got a Baby.” “Dear Mama” director Allen Hughes co-helmed the music videos for the latter two with his twin Albert during the 1990s.
The first episode opens with a retelling of the events of Halloween 1993, when Tupac saw two white men harassing a Black motorist late one night in Atlanta and intervened. Things escalated when one of the white men punched the Black motorist and brandished a gun. Tupac then retrieved his own pistol, and as an eyewitness tells it, got down on one knee like a marksman and shot both men, who turned out to be off-duty police officers. Later that night, as law enforcement surrounded the hotel where the rapper and his entourage were partying, Tupac played the song he’d just recorded: “Dear Mama.”
The anecdote introduces the show’s central conflict: the dichotomy between the rapper’s poetic prowess and the violence that surrounded (and eventually enveloped) him, while also spotlighting his desire to protect Black people, something he learned from his mother.
But this musical narrative expands beyond Tupac’s greatest hits, with Hughes weaving in the sounds of the ’70s and ’90s to accentuate the show’s themes. For example, Al B. Sure’s “Nite and Day” sets up a pivotal interview with a then 17-year- old Tupac, who demonstrates a real knack for articulating the sociopolitical issues of the day, thanks to his mother’s influence.
Other needle drops include Curtis Mayfield’s “Billy Jack” and the Spinners’ song “Sadie,” as well as music from Tupac’s contemporaries — LL Cool J (“Going Back to Cali”) and Eric B. & Rakim (“Paid in Full”), plus Mariah Carey’s “Vision of Love.” Hughes also leans on less obvious cues like Don Mclean’s “Vincent,” which underscores Tupac’s love of all forms of art and an affinity for Vincent Van Gogh.