Bet You Didn’t Know: Secrets Behind The Making Of “The Five Heartbeats”

Cult Classic

Though the movie failed to produce the numbers the studio would have wanted at the time, The Five Heartbeats went on to become a classic film in the black and even mainstream community. (You know networks love to show the edited version of that movie on tv, sometimes weekend after weekend.) Over 20 years after the film was released, fans still run up on Leon “JT” and ask him ‘how he could do his brother like that.’ Others still recognize Tressa Thomas, a grown woman, though she was only 11 when the movie was filmed. Another man even came up to Townsend and said that he was strung out on heroin when he saw the film; but the last scene with “Eddie” singing “I Feel Like Going On” inspired him to do better.