Showtime has unveiled the premiere dates for its next slate of documentaries set to air this year as part of its “Hip Hop 50” programming.
Following last year’s films — You’re Watching Video Music Box, Ricky Powell: The Individualist and Rolling Like Thunder — the premium network announced in a press release that Cypress Hill: Insane in The Brain, Bushwick Bill: Geto Boy and The Savage Life of Lorine Padilla will air in April.
Produced by Sony Music Entertainment and Nas’ Mass Appeal, Insane In The Brain chronicles the rise of the groundbreaking hip hop group Cypress Hill. The film takes a look at how the group’s Latin roots and West Coast upbringing shaped the trajectory of their careers. It also dives into the cannabis movement the group has rapped about and advocated for over the last 39 years.
At the core of Insane in the Brain is a story about “brotherhood that has withstood the test of time to create a truly original, everlasting legacy,” Showtime states. It’s directed by photographer and director Estevan Oriol who used a variety of never-before-seen archival footage that he captured himself. It also features Oriol’s very own images of band members B Real, DJ Muggs, Sen Dog and Eric “Bobo” Correa, and the stories behind them. Fittingly the Cypress Hill documentary will air on April 20.
The other “Hip Hop 50” documentary rap enthusiasts should enjoy is about Geto Boys rapper and producer Richard Shaw a.k.a. Bushwick Bill.
Buchwick Bill: Geto Boy shines the spotlight on Shaw’s early life in Jamaica, his years as a platinum selling recording artist in Houston and also touches on the near-death accidental shooting that left him blinded in one eye. Fans will also get to see the late Shaw’s efforts to combat music censorship. Bushwick Bill: Geto Boy is directed by Gregy Roman and produced by Memory & Imagination’s Kyra Kowasic and Richard Shaw. It premieres on Showtime Friday, April 29.
The third doc, La Madrina: The Savage Life of Lorine Padilla is about a “beloved South Bronx matriarch who struggles to remain visible in a rapidly gentrifying community she helped rebuild in the 1980s,” according to Showtime’s synopsis. It airs April 15.