Johnny Depp has signed on to star in Labyrinth. The Guardian reports that the story for this film adaptation comes from Randall Sullivan’s 2002 nonfiction book, LAbyrinth: A Detective Investigates the Murders of Tupac Shakur and Notorious B.I.G., the Implication of Death Row Records’ Suge Knight, and the Origins of the Los Angeles Police Scandal.
In the past, this three-time Oscar-nominated actor has taken on roles in several book-based movies such as Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1998), Sleepy Hollow (1999), and Alice in Wonderland (2010). For this project, Depp will play a detective named Russell Poole.
Here’s more from Rolling Stone: “Poole investigated the Christopher ‘Notorious B.I.G.’ Wallace murder for nearly a year and pushed a theory that Suge Knight orchestrated the rapper’s drive-by shooting death in March 1997 following a Soul Train Awards after-party in Los Angeles. Poole believed that Knight, with the help of LAPD officer David Mack and another associate, was responsible for B.I.G.’s death as ‘retaliation’ for the murder of Tupac Shakur a year earlier. In 1999, Poole was essentially forced into early retirement after implicating a fellow officer in Biggie’s death; he later filed a lawsuit against the LAPD claiming that his First Amendment rights were being violated because he couldn’t take his B.I.G. findings public. Poole later appeared in the 2002 Nick Broomfield documentary Biggie & Tupac, where the former detective-turned-private investigator furthered an additional theory that also placed Shakur’s death at the hands of Knight as a means to avoid paying the rapper his millions of dollars in royalties.” (via People Magazine)