Newcomer Jamal Woolard stars in Notorious, an insightful biopic about Christopher Wallace, AKA The Notorious B.I.G. Through raw talent and sheer determination, East Coast rapper Christopher “Biggie Smalls” Wallace transformed himself from a Brooklyn street hustler to one of the greatest rappers of all time, refusing to succumb to expectations and redefining the notion of “The American Dream.” Twelve years since the rapper’s unfortunate death, Notorious examines the struggle, music and triumph of Christopher Wallace, who became one of the most celebrated hip-hop icons in history. How is to be carrying the weight of the Biggie legacy to the next generation? “I feel like I’m the chosen one—but not conceited or arrogant at all. Just humble and just enjoying my life.” Was it scary playing an icon? “No, it felt good girl! I just went to Biggie boot camp, and I just built that myself. You know, put it into my brain.” So what was the process? “I just wanted to go eat! And get big. And the manners, the behavior, the voice lessons. I went and got Willie Nelson’s greatest hits, because they said one of the things is Mrs. Wallace loved country music. So I wanted to be just that far in. And I didn’t want no flaws. I studied both albums from front to back, every lyric. And I was already a rapper anyway. So it was easy to do. And I made sure I was talking to Faith daily. The footage online, I couldn’t get Christopher. I was only getting Notorious B.I.G.” What did his music mean to you? “The closest I got to B.I.G. was the funeral, sad to say. And just coming from Brooklyn, man, he put a dent on that game. We tried to follow him, he was our hope, he was our everything. And when we lost him, we felt like we lost everything there is.” How did you make your portrayal in Notorious seem so human? “That’s a God gift, man. Maybe I was just the right one for the job. B.I.G. was a hell of a role to play. He wore many hats, as one person. I don’t know what was in my mind. The footage was not giving up nothing. But for B.I.G. to actually take off his shades and talk to you, I didn’t know what he was like when he kissed, what he liked to eat, how he liked to act. I just had to do me, and feel like I was doing the right thing. But I didn’t know. I just tried my best to get my point across. Like I said, the bulk of it, coming from Brooklyn, coming from struggle. Real recognizes real. Like you know how to make salad dressing when you’re broke, mayonnaise and ketchup. And you’re used to it, every day.” Some actors people who portray someone who has passed away, they talk about feeling their presence. Did that ever happen to you? “The whole movie. The whole movie I felt like I was speaking through him. Like the whole movie, just the way it comes off. And I cried, man, it was just too deep. When I first say it, it took me by storm. It’s a movie, like a real movie, it’s the life story of Christopher Wallace. And I think we delivered that perfectly. I hope it touched you.” How did you react when you saw Notorious for that first time? “My eyes teared up at the end. My wife grabbed me and was just like, ‘I’m so proud of you.’ She knew my struggle. So it meant a lot, just knowing. I’ve been through some things in life with my woman. And seeing B.I.G. and how he treated women, I had my own little incidents, and he had the incident. And I’m looking at him now, the realness of it. And how strong a woman she was to say, ‘I’m proud.’” BD + Unrated Extended Cut DVD Bonus Features: Behind-the-Scenes footage, Deleted Scenes, Never-Before-Seen footage of the real B.I.G., a Digital Copy of Notorious, Filmmaker Commentaries and more.

Director Ron Howard presents the untold story behind one of the most unforgettable moments in US political history. When disgraced President Richard M. Nixon (Frank Langella), agreed to an interview with jet-setting TV personality David Frost (Michael Sheen), he thought he’d found the key saving his tarnished legacy. However, Frost would prove to become one of Nixon’s most formidable adversaries during the televised interviews.

Frank Langella  first portrayed Nixon in the Broadway and West End productions of Frost/Nixon, before bringing him to life on the big screen.

How long did it take to become Nixon?

“Oh, it took much longer than just the rehearsal period. It took all during the eight weeks in the first theater, and the twelve weeks in the second theater. And then it was Broadway, and the movie. And I was always peeling that onion, always trying to find deeper, more profound elements of him.”

Was it different being Nixon on stage than on screen?

“Yes, absolutely. A lot of those things are clichés like, you have to hit the back row on the stage, and grander gestures, all of that’s true. Then comes the sort of relief of the camera, because it’s right here. And you know, you can just raise your eyebrow and make an incredible point that you can’t do in the play. So the chief difference is that you can go more internal in a film. And that’s wonderful, it is quite exhilarating and releasing.”

There’s emotion and even humor in your Nixon in Frost/Nixon that’s unfamiliar. Where did that come from?

“I think that I became so protective of him, I became so compassionate towards him, so that every day I played him I was always thinking. And I stopped thinking ‘he’ and started thinking ‘me.’ You know, it stopped being Richard Nixon, it became my creation. He lived with me for such a long time, and I was with him for almost two years, that it was my reacting to whatever was happening. And he got so deep inside me, that no matter what Ron threw at me, like the dog, or a couple of scenes that were totally new, I just felt, oh this is how he’d behave about money. Or a pretty ankle, or a little funny looking dog. So it became second nature to me.”

Given Nixon’s insecurities, did it amaze you that he became a U.S. president?

“No, it doesn’t amaze me. My philosophy about that is, if you have will power and strength, you can overcome. And it’s actually the people who have the most to overcome, who usually go the furthest. And some people pay the price for that, as Nixon did, because they knock themselves down. Because they can’t handle what they’ve achieved. You’ll discover when you talk to really successful people, that the vast majority of them were the runts of the litter! They were the middle kid, or the funniest looking one. Or the one that everyone thought would never amount to anything. I was one of those kids. I was a four-eyed little kid, and I was very shy and backward. And I had to fight to come up from that. And whenever I wanted to go out with a girl, she wanted to go out with the football captain. She didn’t want a skinny little guy who wanted to be an actor. And I was like, what? So I had a lot to overcome. And the characters I play most of the time are people who are fighting large scale, epic problems.”

Do you see Frost/Nixon as relevant to politics today?

“I don’t think the film is a political movie. I think it’s a movie about survival. It’s a movie about two men who are trying to resurrect their careers, trying to outfox each other. And each of whom is having a particular emotional crisis. And that’s universal. That’s in all of us. I don’t think Universal (Studios) is unaware that this is a political figure in a very political time, but I think the movie stands as a movie, about two men trying to win.”

If Nixon were alive today, what would you say to him?

“I’ve never been asked that question… I would try to embrace him. I would try to somehow get across to him that, living with you for so long, sir, I feel great compassion for your pain, more than anything else. The thing that Richard Nixon needed more than anything else was a kind of deep and profound acceptance that he never got probably, from his father. Lots of men suffer from this. Lots of men spend their lives looking for fathers who never gave them a sense of themselves as men, particularly in the puberty period when you’re just coming into your manhood. That’s really when you need your dad there. And I don’t think Nixon ever had that.”

BD + DVD Bonus Features: “The Making Of Frost/Nixon,” “The Nixon Chronicles” and “Discovering Secrets” featurettes, footage from “The Real Interview,” a look inside “The Nixon Library,” Commentary with Howard, BD Live! U-Control and Deleted Scenes.