Rosie Perez revealed that she was the matchmaker responsible for setting up her “good friend” Tupac Shakur with Madonna while appearing on The Drew Barrymore Show.
Three decades after the Queen of Pop, 66, and the late rap icon, who was tragically murdered in 1996 at the age of 25, secretly dated, Perez, 60, revealed how they met while attending the 7th annual Soul Train Music Awards attended in 1993 as her date.
Perez revealed that Shakur sweetly offered to accompany her to the event after her date released her for a “half hour” before she was scheduled to leave for the awards show.
“I didn’t know you used to be such good friends with Tupac Shakur. Do I have the right story? Something about dating something?” Barrymore asked.
Perez then recalled how her scheduled date called her and told her, “I can’t go with you because my girlfriend will see me.”
Rosie Perez revealed that she was the matchmaker responsible for setting up her “good friend” Tupac Shakur and Madonna while appearing on The Drew Barrymore Show; seen in 1993
After “laying out that truth” and hanging up on her original date, she said her phone started ringing and it was Shakur, saying, “I’m coming with you.” We walk in, we pretend we’re on a date and he dies.’
Eventually, Perez said she ran into Madonna, who asked if they were a couple.
After explaining that wasn’t the case, she said the Material Girl hitmaker asked her to pair them up.
Perez replied, “You got it!”
Although they largely kept their relationship out of the spotlight, Shakur and Madonna reportedly dated for almost two years until calling it quits in January 1995.
In 2017, a letter from Shakur to the singer, dated January 15, 1995, revealed why he broke up with him.
“If you were seen with a black man it wouldn’t jeopardize your career in any way, if anything it would make you seem much more open and exciting. But for me, at least in my previous perception, I felt that because of my ‘image’ I would be letting down half the people who made me what I thought I was,” he allegedly wrote, according ABC News.
He continued, “I never meant to hurt you.”
Three decades after the Queen of Pop, 66, and the late rap icon, who was tragically murdered in 1996 at the age of 25, secretly dated, Perez, 60, revealed how they met while attending the 7th annual Soul Train Music Awards attended in 1993 as her date
Although they largely kept their relationship out of the spotlight, Shakur and Madonna reportedly dated for almost two years until calling it quits in January 1995 (seen in 1994).
Elsewhere in the three-page letter, Shakur wrote, “An interview where you said ‘I’m going to rehabilitate all the rappers and basketball players’ or something to that effect… cut me deep… I never knew you to hang out with another rapper than myself.’
He also apologized for not being the kind of friend he “could be.”
“Please understand my previous position as that of a young man with limited experience [an] extremely famous sex symbol,” he said.
“I don’t know how you feel about visiting me, but if you could find it in your heart, I would like to speak with you personally,” he concluded.
Perez recalled that Madonna asked her to hook them up, which she did
According to Fashionthe letter was written during his time at the Clinton Correctional Facility.
Madonna was 34 and Tupac was 21 when they dated in the early 1990s.
