Drake famously started his entertainment career on the Canadian teen drama Degrassi: The Next Generation, on which he starred as Jimmy Brooks for seven seasons. And though his character was part of one of the show’s most high-profile episodes — when Jimmy ended up in a wheelchair after being shot during a terrifying school shooting — Drake initially saw the storyline as a hindrance to his then-budding rap career, according to a new interview with a Degrassi writer.
In an oral history honoring the 20th anniversary of the show’s first episode, show writer James Hurst told AV Club that there was pushback from Drake’s camp — back when he was still known as Aubrey Graham — about his return to the show if his character remained in a wheelchair.
“There was a letter from a law firm in Toronto, and it was from Aubrey,” Hurst told AV Club. “It was an odd letter that said, ‘Aubrey Graham will not return to Degrassi season 6 as Jimmy Brooks unless his injury is healed, and he’s out of the wheelchair.’ I said, ‘Get him down here.’ He came in and was like, ‘What letter? I don’t know about that.’ And I said, ‘All right, I understand. But how do you feel about the wheelchair?’ He’s like, ‘All my friends in the rap game say I’m soft because I’m in a wheelchair.’ And I said, ‘Well, tell your friends in the rap game that you got shot. How much harder can you get? You got shot, and you’re in a wheelchair.'”
