This is the struggle at the heart of the documentary and DMX himself as he tries to overcome his demons and also find joy. Seconds later, the two are laughing together playing Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots. And the way he knows is to continue the verbal abuse even as his instinctive reaction is to provide the physical affection his crying son craves. We’re watching a man at odds with himself - battling the history of abuse he endured from his own mother while trying to love his son the best way he knows how. Then he sits Exodus on his lap, trying to comfort him, but he can’t do it without the hypermasculinity and the stereotypical, “You’re tough as s-, right? Nobody wants to hear that,” even as he tries to show physical affection. The boy was playing with a phone and DMX grabs it, cursing and snarling at him. The hardest scene for me to watch came during a short interaction with his toddler, Exodus. The 80-minute documentary, DMX: Don’t Try To Understand, gives us the unfiltered DMX, even the parts we want to turn our heads from. He didn’t want the project to sugarcoat anything.”
“One of the things about Earl and a lot of those uncomfortable situations aren’t so uncomfortable to him. It just felt invasive and icky.įrierson explained his thinking behind including these difficult moments: “ was meant to be the truest representation of the man at this point in his life and to alter those things doesn’t speak truth to the reality of the situation,” he said. The latter scene included voice messages and phone calls from friends and family concerned about his well-being.
To be frank, there are parts of the documentary that made me feel wrong for watching: DMX and his fiancee, Desiree Lindstrom, argue about his relationships with other women while cameras are peering around corners and Lindstrom is begging him to turn his mic off the rapper cursing about the amount of money the other mothers of his children are receiving from him and the night DMX’s drug addiction sent him to rehab. The 80-minute doc gives us the unfiltered DMX, even the parts we want to turn our heads from. I wanted to set out to find out the veracity and untruths of the Earl we saw on VH1 and TMZ.”Ĭameras follow DMX through his old ‘hood, documenting his relationship with his children and their mothers, his drug addiction and the rehabilitation that led to his career rejuvenation. “DMX’s music means so much to people and it’s unfair that his narrative was defined by the media more than himself or his art.
“I’m into characters and the way the media defines them,” said Frierson. Director Chris Frierson had unfettered access to DMX, starting as the rapper was released from a yearlong bid in jail for tax fraud.Įarl “DMX” Simmons (center) with his son Exodus Simmons (left) and fiancee Desiree Lindstrom (right). The HBO documentary, DMX: Don’t Try To Understand, airing Thursday, is a jolt of unsettling reality and a reminder of the demons Simmons had to face. X seemed to have found happiness.Įight weeks later, he’d be found dead from a cocaine-induced heart attack.Īs painful as DMX’s death was for many who grew up loving him (I’d just written a profile where I talked to people close to him about his newfound happiness and was shattered by his death), there was a level of peace in knowing the joy in his final chapter. And when he was a guest on Noreaga’s Drink Champs show in February, a three-hour journey of stories, laughter and healing ensued. The next few months would feature viral videos of X, real name Earl Simmons, dancing to ’70s soul, offering a different side to the snarling, lyrically violent persona that made him famous. He popped up on a Verzuz with Snoop Dogg last July looking healthy and happy and reminding everyone that he was once the biggest music star in the world.
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