‘Turn off the lights…’ Teddy Pendergrass biopic announced — and guess who’s playing him
It's the biopic you may have been waiting for -- Tyrese Gibson is set to portray a soul legend as the story of the powerful, but silky voiced crooner comes to the big screen
Singer and actor Tyrese Gibson has been chosen to portray silky smooth soul singer Teddy Pendergrass in an upcoming biopic after Warner Bros. acquired the life rights of the late singer.
“I am honored to take this journey… this is the role that I feel I was born to play. Teddy Pendergrass embraced me and before he passed put the responsibility on my shoulders to tell his story,” Gibson said, according to Deadline. “Being here in this time and in this space and moment with Lee Daniels, Donald De Line, Little Marvin and Warner Bros is an answered prayer. Teddy, I just hope we make you, your wife and family proud… Here we go!!”
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Gibson, a Grammy-nominated R&B singer and actor in the Fast and Furious film franchise, will star in and produce the biopic via his Voltron Pictures, along with De Line via his De Line Pictures studio banner, and Daniels, who is behind vehicles including Empire, The Butler and Precious. Little Marvin, who created Amazon’s upcoming event series Them, will pen the screenplay. Pendergrass’ widow, Joan, is an executive producer.
Born in 1950, Pendergrass was raised by his single mother Ida, whose husband, Jesse, left the family when the singer was young. Shortly after meeting his father for the first time, he was stabbed to death in 1962 when the boy was 11 years old.
He skyrocketed to fame in the early 1970s, as the lead singer of Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes before hitting it big as a solo artist with mass crossover appeal. From 1977 to 1981, Pendergrass released four consecutive platinum albums, setting a record at that time for an African-American R&B artist.
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In 1982, while driving his Rolls Royce, Pendergrass lost control of his vehicle on Lincoln Drive in Philadelphia, hitting a guard rail before crossing into opposing traffic and crashing into two trees. He suffered a spinal cord injury that left him a quadriplegic, paralyzed from the chest down for the rest of his life.
Pendergrass had to learn how to sing all over again, as a paraplegic. On July 13, 1985, he made a triumphant return to the stage during the historical Live Aid Concert at Wembley Stadium in London in front of 100,000 people and over 1.5 billion television viewers.
He continued his solo career until retiring in 2007, later establishing the Teddy Pendergrass Alliance to help those with spinal cord injuries. He died in 2010 at age 59.
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