Those who have seen the Notorious
biopic will question the absence of one key figure in the life of the
Notorious B.I.G. shortly before he died: Miss Charli Baltimore. Tiffany Lane
aka Charli Baltimore broke out on the scene following the death Christopher
Wallace. Her breed of raw rap—comparable to Lil’ Kim in her explicit
style, though not quite as suggestive—brought Charli
to the spotlight without a constant cosign as a former love of Biggie.
The
Philly native’s place in the Commission was sealed, but sadly that project
never came to fruition. Here, Miss Baltimore discusses in depth some aspects of
Notorious that hid the truth and how
she feels the world is handling Biggie’s posthumous presence.
AllHipHop.com: First
off, have you seen Notorious?
Charli Baltimore:
No, and I don’t really want to see it either. I feel as though it’s
not—it wasn’t portrayed realistically.
AllHipHop.com: People
have been questioning why you were left out of the film.
Charli Baltimore:
From what I’m understanding, the one particular scene which I guess bothered me
more than anything was that me and B.I.G. were in a really, really, traumatic
car accident. I almost died in that car accident and for them to downplay
it—and again I didn’t see the movie so I don’t know how much it’s
downplayed or not—but for them to downplay it the way that it was, the
way that it occurred…it bothered me. That’s what probably bothers me more so
than anything. I don’t usually do too many interviews regarding Big.
AllHipHop.com:
The scene is where they show the car accident, there is a girl in the backseat
who I assume is you and then the accident just kind of happens…
Charli Baltimore:
I went through the windshield. I was in the backseat, that’s true. Cease lost
all of his teeth… every last one of his teeth got knocked out. He was the
driver. From what I understand it’s portrayed in the movie like it was really
lightweight, and it had a lot of bearing on Big’s album. And again, everybody
in that car almost lost their life. So I don’t play that, it’s not cool at all.
Big had to have the Jaws of Life remove him, and that was a
really pivotal moment in his career because that’s what caused him to do the
double album for Life After Death.
So, you know, the movie is his mother’s story, which is how I’m getting it, but
again she wasn’t there and I had 22 stitches under my hairline that…I was the
first person that was taken out of the scene of the accident because any sort
of head injuries they take you first.
That was a really serious accident. It wasn’t a fender
bender. It was an accident where we went over the divider and were on to the
other side of the oncoming traffic going the opposite direction and almost went
over an embankment. So for them to downplay that particular event was a little
shocking to me the way that I got it. Like I said, I didn’t see it so I don’t
know but I know that I still got plenty of stitches and plenty of sometimes
ailments to prove that the accident was no joke. Big had a metal rod that had
to be inserted into his leg and it had a lot to do with him having a life
changing experience that in all actuality Big was not supposed to walk again.
Because of his weight, he had sleep apnea, he was told that he would probably
always have a wheelchair or possibly even a walker and he kind of defied all
odds. We sat in the hospital and he had to go through therapy and he had to
basically learn how to walk again.
[Big] was in a rehabilitation facility for three months
because he had to learn how to walk, and he was determined to do that. Not to
mention he still had a deadline to do this album. You gotta remember when this
happened that Big’s album was almost done. When we got in the hospital and all
this craziness happened, he said, “You know what ma, I’m going to do a double
album.” I’m like, “Get the hell out of here.” People weren’t really doing that
kind of stuff back then. So he really sat and he like…he did it. It was very
inspiring to watch someone do that under the circumstances that he was under,
which was craziness. People telling him that you might never walk again
properly, you may be in a wheelchair, he wasn’t trying to hear any of that
sh*t. He was like, “Hey, I’ma walk again. I’ma be fine.”
AllHipHop.com:
Are you angry about your absence in the movie?
Charli Baltimore:
Well you know, if anybody has a right to be mad about
the movie it should be maybe Un or D-Roc. I think that a lot of people who are
portraying themselves in this movie have no idea what type of person that Big
was and one of the funniest things I could recall is that…I was thinking about
something Big used to do everyday at a certain time. I can’t remember the exact
time, but I remember everyday at a certain time Big would have at least a
45-minute to an hour conversation with Lance “Un” Rivera, his business partner.
And from what I understand, he’s barely in the movie. That was one of Big’s
closest confidants. I feel as though if anyone should be mad really…I’ll even
go so far as to say let’s skip Un, I would say D-Roc. I know how much Big loved
D-Roc, and I know that that was unconditional love. That was real just
brotherly just, straight out I’ll do anything for this dude, and vice versa.
AllHipHop.com:
D-Roc isn’t portrayed much in the movie either following his prison term.
Charli Baltimore:
I don’t understand any of that. I really don’t. I mean, D-Roc lived with Big.
Big loved D-Roc, that was his brother you might as well say….brother from
another mother. So if anybody should be telling Big’s story…I’m not mad about
the movie…but if anybody should be telling Big’s story, it should either be
D-Roc or Un because these are the people that Big confided in the most. Not
Puff, not these other people or whoever claimed to be a part of this film. I
remember these everyday phone calls [between Big and Un]. It didn’t matter what
the situation was, what country we were in, Lance and Big had this conversation
every day.
Like I said I’m not bitter about the film because for me, I
always felt like my relationship really was nobody’s business. I know what I
had with Big; I didn’t really need to explain it to anyone. But I also…you know
Big confided in me as a boyfriend would confide in a girlfriend. So I know a
lot of things about Big that I would never discuss with anyone.
AllHipHop.com:
What about you in this equation? You were with Big when he passed; you were a
very important part of his life.
Charli Baltimore:
I had just left L.A. when he died. I had left I think two days prior. I had
some personal things I had to take care of, and I had actually just lost one of
my best friends on Valentine’s Day; they had just gotten killed. That was one
of the main reasons Big wanted me to come to L.A., just so I could take my mind
off that. Actually me and Big had a lot of drama in L.A. What was funny was the
homicide police came to my house after Big died, which was kind of weird to me
but they were just going in all angles. But yeah I was with Big two days before
he died and the funny thing was, he was loving Cali, and he was so happy that
he kind of defied all the odds and was able to walk.
If you notice in the “Hypnotize” video he just has the
cane…he defied all of the things with the walker, with the wheelchair…he was in
the hospital for three months undergoing intensive therapy. So that particular
moment in time was what lead to Life
After Death. That’s why that album was called that. Big was just determined
to make it the best that he could make it. I don’t think that people realize
that. I think that if they were going to make a movie about Big’s life, it
should have concentrated more on his music. His personal life was really
honestly nobody’s business, and if he was alive I don’t think he would have
wanted that.
I mean if someone was going to make a movie about Big’s
personal life then it should have been Faith, not Ms. Wallace. I mean come on;
we’re all adults. As an adult, your mother doesn’t know every waking detail of
your personal life. That’s just not realistic. Not to say anything bad about
[Ms. Wallace], but you know I had a relationship with her as well and I have no
idea what she was thinking when she made that movie and kind of just left out
that whole portion of Big’s life that I was there. I was very young when I was
dealing with Big so that was a huge life experience for me, as far as
experiencing death. I had actually experienced a lot of death at one time…my
father died, my best friend died and Big died, all within an eight month period.
I had never experienced anything like that so that was a lot for me to deal
with.
Maybe it made [Voletta Wallace] feel better [to leave Charli
Baltimore out of the film], I don’t know. Maybe it made for juicier story lines
to just use Kim and Faith, I have no clue. It really doesn’t bother me, I
really don’t care. I just don’t like the simple fact that…the one thing that
really bothered me was the car accident thing because again, I have two
daughters and I could have lost my life in that accident and Big also was very
hurt in that accident.
AllHipHop.com:
After Ms. Wallace saw the movie and saw the sides of Big that she didn’t get to
see as a mother, she said that it made her not like that side of Big very much.
She said the person that she saw on the screen was a monster at times.
Charli Baltimore:
I mean if that’s the case, everybody’s a monster sometimes. That’s human
nature. I just don’t feel as though if someone was going to tell Big’s story it
should have been his mother, unless he was a child. Christopher had already
become Biggie and he loved his mother to death, but at the end of the day she
can’t tell the accurate story of where Big was in that place in his life. The
only person that could do that were the people that lived in his crib and were
with him everyday and she was not one of those people.
She’s saying she saw something on screen she didn’t like; of
course you’re going to see something on screen you don’t like. I’m pretty sure
if anybody made a movie about anybody’s grown child, they’re going to see
things they don’t like about their child. Like I said if somebody was going to
do a movie about Big, it should have been Damien…D-Roc. I would continue to say
that over and over again, I wouldn’t care if me and Damien hated each other.
It’s the truth.
Big was one of those people that he’ll tell you what he
wants you to know, but he’s not going to confide in you every little waking
detail of his life. When Damien lived right up the hall from Big, he knew every
intimate detail about Big. Damien’s kind of like me in a sense like he doesn’t
speak out too much about it. He lets people say whatever it is they’re going to
say. Everyone benefited from the Big situation but to me, Damien didn’t benefit
from it. You know what I’m saying? Again, I just feel like the things that Big
is legendary for didn’t have anything to do with his relationships. It should
all have to do with the music because that’s what Big is known for.
AllHipHop.com:
Were you asked at all to have any input in this movie?
Charli Baltimore:
I was never asked to have any input in this movie and I do know the person that
was putting this movie together and actually me and him
were tight, so I have a little issue with that. That person also, he knew Big
but he didn’t know Big like that.
It’s funny to me, the people that put this movie together, it’s almost
like they were picking and gathering information and like sticking it together
and it’s not accurate. I don’t need to see the movie to know that it’s not
accurate so, it is what it is.
In The Long Kiss, Pt. 2: Charli Baltimore explains her relationship with Lil' Kim and not playing Faith in that music video, CLICK HERE.
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