RESPECT. Interview: Gobi Rahimi Discusses Tupac, ‘7 Dayz’ Film and More

This year will make it 19 years since the passing of Tupac Shakur. Today would have been his 44th birthday. With so much time passed, it would be assumed that Tupac would be a long lost memory by now but it seems that as the years go by, the more he becomes relevant. Tupac’s predications on society, growth and life overall have become mantras that many of us have praised and lived by. Gobi Rahimi, film director, producer and someone that was a friend of Tupac, understands how Tupac’s words still resonate over people.

We sat down with Rahimi to discuss Tupac’s last days alive, his upcoming film, ‘7 Dayz‘ on Tupac and more. In honor of Tupac’s of 44th birthday, check out the interview below!

RESPECT.: Tell us about ‘7 Dayz’ and the background to it.

Gobi: I moved to the U.S. in 1979 at the height of the Iran hostage crisis. I was an asthmatic, glasses-wearing, 5’4 nerd that moved to Irvine, California and for the first time in my life I got a good taste of racism and hatred. Because I was known as a camel jockey, I used to get to beat up a lot in high school only because of where I came from and the fact that I had a really long muslim name. So from that age through college, I always felt like an outsider, like somebody who didn’t fit and someone who didn’t belong. I got my degree in marketing, sold real estate in Orange County and I became a top real estate agent.

I met an African-American girl at a wine tasting who was a music video producer. Her name was Tracy Robinson, and within 6 weeks I moved to L.A. and started being a PA for her on music videos and ended up producing with her, probably around 80 to 100 videos. And along the ride I came to meet Tupac. He had asked his assistant to find Tracy because she had been a production assistant on his “Pour Out A Little Liquor” video. He had told her back then as an African-American woman that she should start her own production company because that’s what strong women should do. And she did just that. So when Tupac asked for her help, I came with the package deal.

And I can honestly say from the minute that I met him to the minute he died was the most exciting and rewarding time of my life. Tupac was accepting, loving, appreciative and loyal. And he treated me like family. So in my own head, I felt like I was Tupac’s older brother. I felt somehow it was my duty to protect him. From the minute I met him, you know my people we get attached real quickly, and that’s kind of how we roll. When we love someone we become very loyal to them. I felt like something was going to go down in Vegas. We went to Vegas, and we were hanging at Suge’s club waiting for Tupac to show up, when Nate Dogg started going through the crowd and whispering to everyone, and he walked up to us and he said “Tupac and Suge have been shot.”

Then we basically went to the hospital. I call it the scariest week of my life. There was a character in The GodFather where Michael Corleone went to the hospital when his pops got shot up and outside he saw Enzo The Baker and he said “Enzo, throw your flowers away, put your collar up and put your hands in your pockets like you got a gun.” I felt like I was Enzo The Baker for Tupac at the hospital. While we were there the Vegas PD didn’t cooperate. Death Row wouldn’t help us. We couldn’t get him security and there were death threats. There were undercover FBI agents everywhere. It was mayhem.

Looking back 20 years later, with all of the racial disharmony that is coming to the surface in this country, I think it has always been there. I think if Jesus died for our sins, Tupac died for the violence. Tupac died for the disharmony and for the inequality that really exists between the races. For me he possessed what I would call, a” prophetic energy or a holy energy.” He had a spark of divinity.

RESPECT.: When you found out that Tupac got shot, what were you thinking? Were you expecting the worst?

G: I had never been exposed to that type of violence. I mean look, I came up directing and producing gangster rap videos and I’ve seen and been exposed to people dying and being hurt but it had never been so close to home and it never had been someone I actually cared for. So when we heard it, it felt like a ton of bricks. I remember the ride to the hospital was one of the longest rides I’ve ever taken. In the cab, I was talking to the powers above and I thought to myself there’s no way that God’s gonna let that be; Tupac shot up twice like that and survive. In my head, that’s what I thought. I didn’t think he was going to survive. I thought we’d get to the hospital and he’d be dead already. But he actually lived for seven days and what’s really ironic for me is I left on the night before he died. I left late on the sixth night when the nurse came up to me and she said, “He’s 13 percent better.” It almost felt like that night, on the sixth night, I wasn’t needed anymore, he didn’t need me there anymore. He was secure at that point; it seemed like he was out of physical danger.

So then the next morning when we were going to set and I heard Theo from 92.3-The Beat say Tupac has passed I was honestly shocked because I honestly thought he was a cat with nine lives and that he was actually going to survive. So at first I thought he was going to die and at the end of it I was like maybe he is a super f**king human being, but he wasn’t.

RESPECT.: How was Tupac’s state of mind during his last seven days?

Gobi: For whatever reason it wasn’t important for me to go in and see him or I didn’t feel it was my place to go in and see him. I finally, on the fifth night, I think it was like 3 or 4 in the morning, it was the graveyard shift. There was this big fat white nurse, she was a sweetheart, she was the one who would come out and give me little progress reports when there was no one else in the ER waiting room. And on the fifth night, she’s like, “Son, you’ve been sitting here for these nights and you haven’t gone in, you want to come see him?” And I looked around and there was no one so I said, “Sure I’ll come see him.”

So I went in there and he was in an induced coma, because every time he came to he would wanna pull his plugs out and get out of bed, and the story I was told is gunshot victims when they come to, they come to at the scene of the crime. So that’s the next moment for them. And Tupac being who he was I could only imagine him trying to get out of bed. But he was in an induced coma the entire time so I didn’t hear of any stories of him being conscious. The nurse did tell me a few times that she almost lost him but then you know she gave him 500 CCs of adrenaline and he came right and she’d say “Boy that Tupac of yours, he’s a fighter man. I almost lost him and he came right back.” He was hanging on by a thread.

RESPECT.: You mentioned that you were guys were close but you weren’t best friends. What was the basis of your relationship with Tupac and how does it all tie in with the film?

Gobi: The story is of an insecure minority that was given every opportunity by Tupac. It is surrounded by all that transpired during those 7 days at the hospital. I wasn’t his best friend but we drank and we smoked together and we listened to his music with a group of people. I was just one step away from having the one on one with him that I thought we would have a month, a week or two weeks later if had lived. We were getting there because we had a picture deal a week before he died. And like the sky was the limit, there was no limit for us, it was all open to us. So eventually like I said it’s the transformation that the Gobi character went through as a result of this other human being and it just happened to be Tupac that was allowing me to transform during this process.

RESPECT.: I read that a few years back or so, you tried to put the film together then but it didn’t work out exactly how you wanted. Explain the difference between then and now? How are you raising the money differently?

Gobi: The first time we were trying to make a documentary. The problem we ran into was a good portion of the footage that I own, that I shot of him is during the making of the One Nation album, which is the last album he ever recorded. The problem was we couldn’t get any sort of licensing or clarity on whether we were going to be able to license the footage. So that kind of fizzled out.

This isn’t a documentary anymore, this is based on a script that I wrote eight years ago. And now we will get actors and the only person that will be playing himself is Tupac because I own the content. He’s actually going to be playing himself which is really unique because this will literally be the last film that Tupac will ever star in.

The intention of crowdfunding was to give the fans an opportunity to get involved. An opportunity for the fans to come to the table for the actual film. But we sort of knew unfortunately the hip-hop generation or what I like to call the, “YouTube Generation,” doesn’t like to pay for anything; they want everything for free. And I honestly think that they may even be suspicious to any project that comes out. And for us it was more about getting the social media and media coverage that we’ve gotten, and now we’ve been approached from a slew of outside independent investors. And that’s kind of why we’ve done it this way because we wanted to get the press, the PR and get the awareness out there and we’ve done that.

It’s funny I got a call from a friend of mine in Scotland and she said, “I was on a bus in Edinburgh this morning and the local magazines and newspapers have articles about your movie.” It’s really ironic because the Indiegogo has not a raised a fraction of the money that we need to get. However, as I said we’ve attracted some outside investors and that’s kind of what our game plan was in the first place.

RESPECT.: What type of impact or effect do you think this film will have not only hip-hop but the entertainment industry overall?

Gobi: The film in general covers the last week in Tupac’s life and I think it’s a crucial last week because most people are unaware that he was alive for seven days. But it also covers racism, the hatred and more. For me and my own race, I want my people to actually be exposed to the fact that one of theirs was sitting security for Tupac. So there’s an overall transformation of a very insecure kid that grew up on racism on his own was given his biggest opportunity by Tupac.

RESPECT.: Did you have people from your country or your family/friends ever feel negatively about the fact that you worked with Tupac?

Gobi: No. In my country, even till this day, the kids bump Tupac in the streets. There was only one time there was a bit of backlash. When I was at the hospital I remember my mom, she was living in Arizona at the time, would be listening to the news. And she kept calling me and she’d say, “Son, get out of there. They’re gonna kill you.” And I kept trying to play it down and say, “Mom, that’s all this media. Don’t worry about it. None of that’s happening.” But at the same time I was scared shitless.

RESPECT.: I think that would be a natural reaction definitely because overall like you were saying he had a lot of death threats regardless to whether it was that time or previously, his life was always vulnerable, so I could understand how your mom felt about it.

RESPECT.: How do you keep Pac’s memory alive in your life?

Gobi: Truth be told, I’ve got a ton of photos I took of him and an artist that I know created this work of art of one of my photos on a layout of all the images of a book called, ‘The Rose That Grew From Concrete.’ It’s all the pages but then one of my images is superimposed on it, so he’s looking down on me every day when I look up on the wall. But the reason I’m doing this project is solely because of him. It’s solely because he never took no for an answer if he decided to do something. Even though everyone could be against him and he would have what I call, “haterade” from all directions it didn’t stop him; he would keep moving forward. And in a sense, I think I honor him by giving the world an opportunity to see a side of him that has never been exposed before.

RESPECT.: You mentioned keeping his memory alive and just letting people know the story of his last days. So overall what is your ultimate goal with this film?

Gobi: I think it took me years to come to this realization but he gave me an opportunity to shine and Pac fans without even knowing him or ever sharing space with him are moved emotionally by him. I think this film will give Pac fans and those that may be curious, the opportunity to recognize that within all of us is a thread of divinity and it’s just a matter of allowing that to come out. It took someone like Pac for me to realize that I’m much much more than what I’ve ever admitted to myself and that’s a major portion of the film. A lot of the film is of him planning his future and I think it’s important for that to be shared as well. He was limitless and he allowed for me to be the same.

RESPECT.: Do you feel like if Tupac were still alive or if he lived a little bit longer the effect he had on you he would have that effect on others?

Gobi: A hundred percent. Just before he died, one of the last conversations that I heard him have he said “You know in 6 months no one is going to recognize me because I’m gonna act so mature. In fact I’m gonna be done with all this drama. I may run for the Mayor of Los Angeles because it’s the politicians and the police who are the biggest gangs in America.” He was 25 when he said this. The average 25 year old never even had the consciousness to think about things like that. To me he was progressing and transforming at lightening speed.

I think by now he would’ve deeply been involved in business and politics. And I think he would’ve replaced the Al Sharptons of the world because he came from a revolutionary upbringing. I think by now he would’ve learned how to manipulate the powers that be or what I like to call the “dark forces” that are really pulling the strings for everyone.

RESPECT.: Definitely, I mean there’s plenty of people that say that they want to change the world but half of those people actually don’t really think about it over all and how to actually do it,in the sense where it’s going to help the people and not just only them. He was the type of person that thought about the people. For him I don’t think it was about race, it was just about the people hence why you guys had that relationship. If it was more about just being black, I don’t think the relationship you guys had would’ve been what it was.

Gobi: A hundred percent. He treated me and my Iranian sister like family. He called me his crazy Iranian and from the minute he said that I was like, “I love this guy.”

If you would like to learn more about Rahimi’s film, ‘7 Dayz’ and help fund it, please click here. And make sure to follow the status of the film on Facebook and Twitter.