Eddie Murphy is about to return to the screen for the first time in awhile. He’s starring in Dolemite Is My Name, a Netflix film which begins production June 12 about the life of Rudy Ray Moore, the star of the blaxploitation Dolemite films. Hustle and Flow‘s Craig Brewer is directing a script by Scott Alexander & Larry Karaszewski, the writing team behind such quirky biographical films as Big Eyes, Ed Wood and The People Vs. Larry Flynt. John Davis and John Fox are producing with Murphy, who has been eager to play this role for a decade.

Moore worked in a Hollywood record store in 1970 when he began hearing obscene stories of pimp and hustler named Dolemite. He started a club act where he became Dolemite. He then began generating records that mixed humor and a ghetto fantasy character, burnishing the legend. While too racy to be put on display in record stores, the records became a big inner city underground hit. The proceeds allowed Moore to finance the 1975 film Dolemite, which he starred in as a kung fu-capable pimp ghetto hero who stuck it to The Man. Moore followed with three sequels. He continues to be an influence for the likes of hip hop entrepreneur Snoop Dogg, and he had something of a comeback starring alongside the hip hop group Insane Clown Posse in Big Money Hustlas in 2000.

Murphy last starred in 2016’s Mr Church, and before that in 2012’s A Thousand Words. He and Brewer are WME while the scribes are CAA.