Dr. Dre's ex Michel'le and journalist Dee Barnes recall brutal abuse from Dr. Dre
The movie Straight Outta Compton has been getting rave reviews and has even generated a few Oscars rumors, but not everyone is pleased with the depiction of the N.W.A.
The movie Straight Outta Compton has been getting rave reviews and has even generated a few Oscars rumors, but not everyone is pleased with the depiction of the N.W.A.
Specifically, many are upset at the movie’s portrayal (or lack of portrayal) of the history of abuse surrounding the women involved with the N.W.A.
Michel’le, who was once engaged to Dr. Dre, addressed the fact that Straight Outta Compton didn’t cover the domestic abuse that she suffered during their six year relationship (1990-96) in a recent interview with VladTV. She noted that the movie was “Cube’s version of his life.”
“Why would Dre put me in it? If they start from where they start from,” she added, “I was just a quiet girlfriend who got beat up and told to sit down and shut up.”
Michel’le isn’t the only woman to address Dr. Dre’s past. Journalist Dee Barnes, who was involved in a physical altercation with Dre in January 1991, wrote a reaction piece to the film for Gawker.
“That event isn’t depicted in Straight Outta Compton, but I don’t think it should have been, either,” she wrote. “The truth is too ugly for a general audience. I didn’t want to see a depiction of me getting beat up, just like I didn’t want to see a depiction of Dre beating up Michel’le…But what should have been addressed is that it occurred.”
At the time, Barnes hosted a hip-hop show on Fox called Pump It Up! Dre reportedly attacked Barnes at an album release party in early ’91 because he was upset about a piece that aired the previous November involving N.W.A. Dr. Dre plead no contest to assault charges, and the two settled out of court.
“When I was sitting there in the theater, and the movie’s timeline skipped by my attack without a glance, I was like, ‘Uhhh, what happened?’ Like many of the women that knew and worked with N.W.A., I found myself a casualty of Straight Outta Compton’s revisionist history.”
During a recent interview with Rolling Stone, Dr. Dre addressed the allegations of abuse from Michel’le and the 1991 incident involving Barnes, saying:
I made some f***ing horrible mistakes in my life. I was young, f***ing stupid. I would say all the allegations aren’t true – some of them are. Those are some of the things that I would like to take back. It was really f***ed up. But I paid for those mistakes, and there’s no way in hell that I will ever make another mistake like that again.
