Tupac Shakur

TO OUR READERS On Tuesday, Death Row Records issued The Don Killuminati: The 7 Day Theory. It's recorded under the name Makaveli, but it is the first posthumous release from Tupac Shakur, the 25-year-old rapper who was fatally shot in Las Vegas on Sept. 7. By a timely coincidence, the Inquirer Editorial Board had recently asked students of Philadelphia's Martin Luther King High School to send us their thoughts on what they thought of the music of Tupac Shakur and how they thought he would be remembered.

Rap star and actor Tupac Shakur, Janet Jackson's love interest in the movie Poetic Justice, is free on bail after being charged with shooting two off-duty cops Sunday in Atlanta. The incident happened as two brothers, Mark and Scott Whitwell, were almost hit by two cars as they crossed a street with their wives. A police spokesman said that an argument followed, during which one of the brothers pointed a gun at the people in the two cars. It was not known if the brothers identified themselves as cops.

Gangsta rapper and actor Tupac Shakur, 25, died last night at the University Medical Center in Las Vegas, the first hiphop superstar to become a casualty of the street violence he glorified. Mr. Shakur had been on life support since sustaining multiple gunshot wounds last Saturday in a drive-by ambush on a busy Las Vegas street. Police have made no arrests in the case. Many in rap considered it Mr. Shakur's destiny to die young. For five years, the enormously successful rapper had led a rogue's life, carrying on public feuds with other rappers and engaging in heedless violence.

Oscar-winning actor Daniel Day-Lewis, the son of a writer, has a kindred spirit in new wife Rebecca Miller, the daughter of playwright Arthur Miller. They were married Wednesday in a private ceremony, syndicated columnist Liz Smith reported yesterday. The couple met while Day-Lewis, 39, was making the film version of Arthur Miller's play The Crucible. The movie, which also stars Winona Ryder, opens Wednesday. Rebecca Miller, 32, is an aspiring actress and director. Day-Lewis won an Oscar for his role in My Left Foot.

DeLores Tucker, a black feminist and vocal opponent of gangsta rap lyrics, has sued a group of recording companies and the estate of Tupac Shakur, contending that she was slandered on the late rapper's All Eyez On Me album. Tucker, a former Pennsylvania secretary of state, chair of the Democratic National Committee Black Caucus, and a member of the national board of the NAACP, filed the lawsuit with her husband, William, in U.S. District Court in in Philadelphia seeking more than $10 million in damages from 12 defendants.

He lives? After word came of Tupac Shakur's slaying in 1996, I agreed with the many fans who think he's still alive. It seemed plausible that hip-hop's premiere storyteller had survived the shooting and was chillin' on some Caribbean island, composing raps with the prolificacy of Langston Hughes and recording them at a secure, undisclosed location that only he and Dick Cheney knew about. I could cite plenty of evidence to prove the widely held theory. In the seven years since the rapper-actor was gunned down at age 25 on the Las Vegas Strip, seven posthumous albums have been released - more than when he was alive - and all have gone gold or platinum except the new one, which is No. 2. His funeral, if there was one, didn't make the news.

"Poetic Justice" provides a graphic depiction of why your mail is late. It's the story of a postal worker assigned to deliver mail from L.A. to Oakland. He relieves the monotony by taking along three friends. They stop frequently - for booze, picnics, sex, visits to relatives and other whimsical adventures - but never to deliver mail. (Not once do they stop for rain, snow, sleet hail or gloom of night, so technically he's OK.) "Poetic Justice" is a road movie/love story from John Singleton, who made a splashy debut with the urban youth drama "Boyz N the Hood.

A concert featuring controversial rapper Tupac Shakur was canceled by the city in a move that sparked cries of censorship from music promoters and fans yesterday, as well as cheers of "hurrah" from some local women's groups. The show, featuring Shakur and an assortment of other rap groups, was scheduled for last night at the Robin Hood Dell East. David L. Cohen, Mayor Rendell's chief of staff, said Shakur's music was not "consistent with the family-based entertainment that the city wants to provide.

New York police believe a feud between rap artists Lil' Kim and Foxy Brown turned to gunfire. According to the New York Post: "Hip-hop diva Lil' Kim pleaded ignorance yesterday in the street-corner gun battle that erupted after her crew and another rapper's posse crossed paths outside a radio station. " "Crew?" "Posse?" What are they, street gangs? We had hoped after the shooting deaths of Tupac Shakur and Notorious B.I.G., that rappers would reduce the level of violence they attract and encourage.

I was really shocked at your printed apology to anyone offended by your front-page headline (Sept. 25) about John du Pont. I haven't seen an apology to the fans, family or friends of Tupac Shakur. The headline "It's a Rap" offended me and a few of my friends. Shakur is dead, yes, but he was loved by many. He was not just a "gangsta rapper" - he was a survivor, a realist and a young black man trying to make a living. You owe his fans an apology. CRYSTAL M. DOWNING, Philadelphia

Kendrick Lamar will not lose. At least, he'd better not. The 25-year-old Compton, Calif., rapper's first music video begins with a bold invocation of his muse Tupac Shakur, Lamar claiming the legendary rap martyr challenged him in a dream with the charge "Don't let me die. " The young scion opens his song's first verse with "visions of Martin Luther staring at me. " And on the corporeal plane, Dr. Dre has graced Lamar's forthcoming major-label debut...

Art transcended death Sunday at the Coachella Music Festival when the late, great Tupac Shakur, who was murdered in '96 at age 25, joined Snoop Dogg onstage for a duet on "2 of Amerikaz Most Wanted. " Shirtless, with his tats in perfect view, the hologram of Shakur said, "What the is up, Coachella?!" and moved about the stage. The lifelike mirage was commissioned from a Hollywood effects studio by Dr. Dre. The three-day festival, in Indio, Calif., about 120 miles east of L.A., drew boldfacers galore, incuding Lindsay Lohan, Lea Michele, Katy Perry, and Rihanna.

Julianne Moore opened up about her new role on MSNBC's Morning Joe Tuesday. The highlight may have been a snippet of her forthcoming HBO movie Game Change , based on the 2008 presidential election. Moore's portrayal of former Republican VP nominee Sarah "Barracuda" Palin is even uncannier than Tina Fey 's Saturday Night Live stint - and far more serious. Host Joe Scarborough asked, "What's it like hearing from Sarah Palin, who hasn't seen the film yet, that you guys are doing a hit job on her?"

In an explosive allegation, a former Los Angeles police detective who worked on the investigation into the '96 murder of Tupac Shakur claims the rapper was gunned down at the behest of hip-hop mogul Sean "Diddy" Combs . In excerpts cited in L.A. Weekly, Greg Kading writes in his book Murder Rap that a Southside Crips gang member named Duane "Keffe D" Davis claims he was paid $1 mil to kill Shakur and his friend, former...

Like the large-living criminals who inspired them, gangsta rappers tend to have a short life span. Success isn't the problem, since even the wealthiest ex-thug has a rich well of violent incidents to draw on (and plenty more to invent once those run dry). It's a simple matter of aging: Who wants to hear some guy in his late 30s talk about shooting cops and smoking weed? As it turns out, plenty of people, at least when the rapper in question is Snoop Dogg, who plied his trade at the TLA on Sunday night.

"I'm a cowboy, on a steel horse I ride/I'm wanted dead or alive. " SO SANG Jon Bon Jovi on Bon Jovi's 1986 hit "Wanted Dead or Alive," coincidentally the same time he sang "You Give Love a Bad Name. " So, Richie Sambora, what were you thinking? The band's lead guitarist is reportedly a great guy and a loving family man, but hasn't he been to rehab enough? Richie was arrested about 11 p.m. Tuesday for investigation of driving under the influence of alcohol, with his 10-year-old daughter, Ava, in the car, a woman and another child.

Never forget, that God isn't finished with me yet. - Tupac Shakur If you really want to know what makes Kyle Greenwalt tick, take a peek under the brim of his Souderton baseball cap. There, scribbled along with a few other adages, is a lyric from "Ghetto Gospel," by Tupac Shakur, the late rapper-poet. It's not that Greenwalt, a ferociously talented righthander pitcher, is overtly religious or that he's a huge hip-hop fan. "I listen to everything," he says.

RE THE AUG. 15 letter "It's a gangsta-rap male thing" from Anthony Johnson: From an African-American/ Caucasian-American 21-year-old female - let's be serious, Mr. Johnson, gangsta rap is NOT why we are out here killing each other. People are too quick to stereotype and point fingers, rapidly washing their hands of a situation is why we are out here killing each other. Gangsta rap is not why kids break their curfew and stay out all night on the corners, stirring up trouble - negligent parents are. Gangsta rap is not why a 15-year-old can easily acquire a gun - negligent gun-sellers are. Gangsta rap is not why a child can make it through high school and not know how to read - negligent teachers are. I agree with you 100 percent that we should teach our youth about violence and crime when they are a certain age. And educate them enough so they know that they aren't supposed to follow what someone says in a song, or does in a movie or video.

IN HER later years, C. DeLores Tucker made herself a target of ridicule among younger people, particularly the hip-hop set, over her campaign against rap music. She then became an object of laughter when she filed suit against the estate of rapper Tupac Shakur for comments made in an album. Unknown to the hip-hop set was how much they owed Tucker - how much we all owed her - for her ground-breaking work for equality for minorities and women. She died on Wednesday. She was both a civil-rights leader and a political insider.

There is a reason fans still buy shirts and tattoos in his image and continue to pressure the Las Vegas police to solve his 1996 murder. He was James Dean, Al Pacino's Scarface, and Malcolm X rolled into one. Tupac Shakur was undeniable. Shakur's status as a pop icon continues to grow with the DVD release of the critically acclaimed film Tupac: Resurrection. Directed by Lauren Lazin and produced by Shakur's mother, Afeni, the film cuts and pastes interviews with the star to provide an autobiographical narrative of his life.