Behind the Music

Episode Synopsis

Biggie Smalls, a/k/a Notorious B.I.G., grew up dealing drugs on the streets of Brooklyn's Bed-Stuy, but traded the crack game for the rap game. Composing mesmerizing rhymes about the gangsta life, Biggie ascended to the throne of Hip Hop. But the violent life he left behind caught up to him when a hail of bullets ended his life in L.A. four years ago.And when an L.A.P.D. detective found that the murder trail led back to dirty cops in the department, he was forced to drop his investigation. Biggie Smalls' killing remains unsolved to this day.Now, those who knew Biggie Smalls best speak out on his tumultuous life -- and still-unsolved murder.Behind the Music: Notorious B.I.G. tracks the rapper's life from his youth in Brooklyn's Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood in the '80s (where the one-time Catholic school student succumbed to the "easy" money of dealing drugs at age 13), to his first gigs as a freestyle rapper, to his ascension to the top of the charts under the wing of Sean "Puffy" Combs. The special also examines Biggie's violent, bi-coastal feud with West Coast rap moguls Tupac Shakur and Suge Knight, his rocky relationships with wife Faith Evans and others -- and that night in 1997 when a black Chevy Impala pulled up next to Biggie's SUV on an L.A. street, and a gunman pumped four bullets into the singer's chest.Behind the Music: Notorious B.I.G. features interview footage with Puffy Combs, Russell Simmons, journalists Rob Marriott and Dream Hampton, manager Mr. C, and members of Biggie's "Junior Mafia" crew, as well as Biggie's wife, R&B singer Faith Evans, and his mother Voletta Wallace. In addition, former L.A.P.D. detective Russell Poole reveals his disturbing theory about dirty cops, Death Row Records, and a plot to kill Notorious B.I.G.