Ricky Donnell Ross, or Freeway Rick Ross, as he’s also known, has a very interesting life story. While many have tried to depict adaptations of his life on the big and small screen, or through music, the 62-year-old former drug kingpin is finally getting a chance to tell it his way.
According to Ross, when it comes to choosing someone to play him in his biopic, only one actor comes to mind — Donald Glover.
BET reports that Freeway Rick Ross and film director Mike Ho are working on a biopic depicting the life of Ross, and they recently revealed that they’d love to work with Glover as not only the film’s star, but also as its co-director.
The pair sat down for an interview with VladTV, where at first they were apprehensive about sharing their desire to include the Atlanta creator in the project, with Ross citing that if they let it be known publicly it may affect negotiations.
“If they know I want him, and he want him, they’ll be like, ‘You’re in high demand, buddy,'” said Ross.
However, once it was suggested that sharing the information may also expedite the hiring process, Ross and Ho let the cat out of the bag.
Ho went on to say that Glover is a “hell of an actor” and he’s open to letting him co-direct.
“I’m always down to collaborate,” Ho said. “As a director, every actor is a director to me in the sense of understanding a scene and getting things done. But I think he would be brilliant for it. He was the first name that kind of came up over dinner. And he’s just a genius at what he does.”
Ross shared that he’s been working on a film about his life for over three decades, and has long-searched for the right director to accurately tell his story.
In the interview, Ross also discussed his distaste for FX’s Snowfall, which is loosely based on his life, and how it inaccurately portrays history.
“They had a lion in South Central LA. This is really history that they’re f**king with,” he said. “This is not [something] they just wrote for TV. People know there’s some real in that show. This is really our history. This would be like taking slavery and playing with slavery.”
As for Ross and Ho’s film, Ho says that he intends to tell Ross’s story the right way.
“One of the first things that I said when I sat down with him was like, if we’re gonna tell your story, we gotta be unsafe,” the director said. “Because I feel like when everyone approaches something with him, even the shows that he’s not happy with, all the stuff you hear about Freeway, it’s always a safe version of him. We’ve never seen the raw and uncut true story of what Ross is saying.”
What sealed the deal for Ho and Ross was looking at pictures of Glover.
“This is Rick man,” Ho recalled him and Ross saying after looking at the snaps.
