Ice-T is stepping behind the digicam with Fame and Fentanyl, a two-hour A&E particular airing August 25 at 9 P.M. ET, spotlighting the lethal grip of fentanyl throughout America and the lives it continues to steal—together with these of Prince, Mac Miller, and Coolio.
The Hip-Hop icon serves as each host and govt producer of the documentary, which weaves collectively harrowing tales from grieving households, legislation enforcement officers and the music business’s most tragic losses.
The mission goals to show the scope of fentanyl’s devastation and educate viewers on its deadly presence within the drug provide.
“Fentanyl, for me, got here out of nowhere. By the point I realized concerning the drug, I had already misplaced folks to it. It’s a poison within the drug world, and I needed to do every thing that I might to make folks conscious of its hazard,” Ice-T stated in a press release concerning the mission. “Everybody is aware of somebody who has fallen sufferer to fentanyl.”
The movie arrives because the U.S. sees a pointy decline in overdose deaths.
In accordance with the Facilities for Illness Management and Prevention, drug-related fatalities dropped from 110,037 in 2023 to 80,391 in 2024—a 27% lower.
Opioid overdoses, together with these involving fentanyl, fell from 83,140 to 54,743 throughout the identical interval. Nonetheless, fentanyl stays the main reason for overdose deaths, accounting for practically 70% of all drug fatalities.
“These are the tales that everybody wants to listen to,” Ice-T added.
Amongst these tales are the high-profile deaths of artists who unknowingly consumed fentanyl-laced substances. Prince died in 2016 after taking counterfeit painkillers containing the artificial opioid.
Mac Miller handed away in 2018 from a mixture of fentanyl, cocaine and alcohol.
Coolio, finest identified for “Gangsta’s Paradise,” died in 2022 with fentanyl, heroin and methamphetamine in his system.
The record continues with Wealthy Homie Quan, who died in 2024 from a mix of fentanyl, codeine, alprazolam and promethazine.
The documentary dives into how fentanyl is commonly consumed unknowingly, because it’s incessantly combined with different substances.
In accordance with the Drug Enforcement Administration, 5 out of 10 capsules examined in 2024 contained a doubtlessly deadly dose of fentanyl—down from 7 out of 10 the 12 months earlier than.
The CDC additionally reported that overdose charges are nonetheless disproportionately excessive amongst Black, Hispanic, American Indian and multiracial populations, with the very best demise charges amongst adults over 55.
