Rosie Perez and Madonna at the 1993 Soul Train Music Awards. CREDIT: Ron Galella, Ltd./Ron Galella Collection via Getty Images

Rosie Perez on how Madonna asked her to “hook her up” with Tupac

"She came up to me and she was like, 'Yo, what's up? Y'all are together?'"

by · NME

Rosie Perez has shared that Madonna once asked her to “hook her up” with Tupac Shakur.

Last Thursday (November 7), Perez appeared as a special guest on The Drew Barrymore Show to promote her new Apple TV+ series Before, in which she stars alongside Billy Crystal.

Per Complex, Perez recalled preparing to attend the 1993 Soul Train Music Awards – she was stood up by her unnamed date at the last minute, so Shakur stepped in to replace him.

“He said, ‘You know what, I’m gonna go with you, we’re gonna walk up in there, we’re gonna act like we’re on a date, and he’s going to die,'” she remembered their conversation going.

At the awards ceremony, she was apparently approached by Madonna: “She came up to me and she was like, ‘Yo, what’s up? Y’all are together?'” she said. “I said, ‘No,’ she goes, ‘Really?’ I go, ‘Yeah,’ she goes, ‘Hook me up.’ I said, ‘You got it.'”

Rosie Perez at the world premiere of ‘Before’. CREDIT: Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Images

The dalliance between Madonna and Shakur had been a long-standing rumour – that is, until 2015, when she confirmed it in a Howard Stern interview.

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“I was mad at [David Letterman] when I said the F-word a lot. I was in a weird mood that day. I was dating Tupac Shakur at the time and the thing is he got me all riled up on life in general,” she told the veteran DJ. “So when I went on the show I was feeling very gangsta.”

Two years later, a handwritten letter by Shakur, addressed to Madonna, was unearthed for an auction – it details the reasons why the late rapper decided to break up with her.

The auction was later halted due to an emergency court order by Madonna. However, the judge threw out the lawsuit and the letter was re-entered into auction in 2019.

In other recent Madonna news, the pop veteran made her feelings known about Trump’s re-election as US president. “Trying to get my head around why a convicted felon, rapist, bigot was chosen to lead our country because he’s good for the economy?”, she wrote in an Instagram Story.