Was he a fierce respecter of women who ran through a long series of partners and spent time in jail for a crime of sexual violence? Yes. Was he an artist praised for his authenticity who, at the same time, came from a performing background and viewed his public persona as another character to play? Absolutely. Hughes and editor/co-writer/producer Lasse Järvi have made a documentary that’s five hours of grappling, since there’s no concrete “solution” to the mysteries of Tupac. It’s still hung up on a certain amount of hagiography for both mother and son, but it’s a sort of blemishes-and-all hagiography, an attempt to juxtapose their aspirations and reconcile their contradictions. With that as an aspiration, and Glo as one of its most dynamic and endearing legacy caretakers, Dear Mama comes very close at times. That means blemishes and all, so people can understand that whole thing of what makes a human being.” She battled addiction and, with her years of financial difficulties, she continually uprooted her family and contributed to the displacement that shaped her son’s psyche, not always in positive ways.Īs Glo, Tupac’s aunt and Afeni’s sister, puts it in the documentary, “Where did Tupac get the myth-building from? Afeni. In some circles she was a feminist standard-bearer and she was a key figure in fighting homophobia in her movement (a side of her biography that goes completely unmentioned in Dear Mama). With no legal training, she represented herself in court. Afeni was a leader in the Black Panther Party, spending much of her pregnancy with the future music superstar in prison as one of the so-called Panther 21. Hughes’ approach, one that has been taken before in Tupac scholarship but surely not at this depth, is to directly parallel the lives of Tupac and his mother Afeni Shakur.ĭear Mama doesn’t quite have a 50-50 split in its focus, but even giving Afeni Shakur 30 percent of the screentime here produces interesting results.
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