Ashanti Writing Music For ‘Tupac’ Biopic, Belle & Sebastian Scoring ‘The Dog Thrower’ Starring Matthew Perry

As directors and screenwriters prep their scripts and shots, behind-the-scenes composers and songwriters start tuning the music to accompany those projects. And more often these days, it’s not composers being sought create the soundtrack to music, but pop stars and bands, and today brings news of a couple famous names bringing their brand to some upcoming movies.

First up, the forever-developing “Tupac” biopic—which now has John Singleton attached to direct—seems to be taking another step toward actually happening, nabbing Ashanti to contribute new tracks to the film. “I have an amazing opportunity,” she told Complex (via Hip Hop DX), “L.T. Hutton, who actually produced the ‘I Got It’ record and ‘Scars’ and a bunch of other records on my album, he’s one of the CEO’s over at Morgan Creek [Pictures]. And him and I are gonna be doing like a musical score, or a lot of music, for the Tupac film coming in 2015. So I’m super excited about that, I’ve known about this for like two [or] three years now. He’s very, very excited about it. [It’s] very premature, early in stages—oh, and John Singleton is gonna be directing. So that’s gonna be sick, so I’m really, really excited about that.”

Ashanti has long cited Tupac as an influence on her music, and her third album Concrete Rose was inspired by the rapper’s nickname, “The Rose That Grew From Concrete.” But like the singer said, it’s all “early stages” for this project and given its rocky history, who knows if this iteration will pan out.

Meanwhile over in Scotland, twee faves Belle & Sebastian are writing a score for “The Dog Thrower,” reports Herald Scotland. The film project for ITV will be directed by Jon Ronson (he wrote “Frank” and helmed “Stanley Kubrick’s Boxes“), stars Matthew Perry, and according to Deadline, tells “the story of a man who finds fame, then infamy, when he starts throwing his dog.” That’s certainly a pretty wacky set of ingredients so we’ll see how this pans out, but we’re interested.

And speaking of Belle & Sebastian, frontman Stuart Murdoch‘s directorial debut “God Help The Girl” continues its festival run. And after hitting Sundance and Berlin, it’s headed to SXSW and a new poster has been unveiled. Check it out below.