At the same time that Preme was getting his crew situated at Baisley Projects, a movie came out that impacted him and all of the young drug dealers of the era. “In the early-’80s when Scarface came out, all the young cats wanted o be like that,” Lance said. Scarface was a movie about them and for them. The Supreme Team embraced the gun culture promoted by the movie. Firearms became a must have fashion accessory. A “shoot or be shot” mentality emerged. The guns gave them a feeling of having juice or power over their rivals.
“It made all of the youngsters dream. All the youngsters wanted to be drug dealers. It gave us a dream,” Antoine Clark from F.E.D.S. magazine said. “This was the bible. It was inspirational. Had people taking risks. Doing crazy shit. Glamorizing sex, guns and drugs.” And as big of an impact as it had on the drug world, its effect was equally important on hip-hop culture.
“They saw this come up. To the people in the hood it was a way to get on. Nino was working Scarface in New Jack City. It made niggas want to get money. It’s the classic hustler movie. They went crazy with Scarface,” Antoine said. “None of us thought we could be Scarface, but we could have that mentality of taking over wherever we went. He gave us that mentality.”
Scarface made selling drugs seem cool and lucrative. It romanticized the dope game while glamorizing it and led a whole generation of youth astray. In reality that movie corrupted the black community. It made dudes want to be hustlers and get money by any means necessary. Supreme was one of those who took the Scarface mentality to heart.
He dressed in expensive white suits with the crisp white shirt open just like Tony Montana. He embraced the swagger and adopted the fictional gangster’s style. He carried himself with the class of an older, more established hustler even when he wasn’t. His debonair appearance and demeanor was what made the Supreme Team willing to go to war for Preme. It was his presence, his class. Preme was the epitome of gangster cool. “He’s very charismatic, he can be the perfect gentleman, but he wants to win at all costs,” T says. “He is not an abrasive dude. He’s a good hearted individual.” Behind the ghetto glitz and kind heart was a seriousness about hustling that elevated Preme above his many peers on the streets.
This is an excerpt from The Supreme Team
