Entertainment

LIMP BIZKIT RAPPER DIRECTS DRAMA

Fred Durst has traded the nookie for a box of Kleenex. The brash lead singer of Limp Bizkit – currently on extended hiatus – is actually a closet mush case and the director behind “The Longshots,” a tear-jerker starring Ice Cube that hits theaters Friday.

“People only saw one side of me, but there’s much more,” says Durst. “I have an extremely sensitive side.”

His emotions weren’t the only thing Durst kept bottled up while helping churn out six studio albums that spawned 13 Top 10 hits, including “Rollin’,” “My Way” and “Nookie.” The North Carolina native holstered his deep love for cinema and became hooked on Francis Ford Coppola’s classic “Apocalypse Now.”

“I’ve always been a fan of movies. They allow you to escape and let your imagination run wild,” says Durst. “But after seeing that one, I knew I wanted to get involved in making them one day.”

Once Limp Bizkit went on hiatus in 2005, Durst began meeting with major studios which refused to accept his work directing music videos as real experience. He politely shook the execs’ hands and kept dreaming. A little over a year later, he was given his first break.

Durst was reeled in to direct “The Education of Charlie Banks,” starring Jason Ritter, son of the late John Ritter. The dramatic film shined at the 2007 TriBeCa Film Festival, winning the “Made in New York” Narrative Feature Award.

A year later, Durst is now helping retell the true story of Jasmine Plummer (played by Keke Palmer), the first female to play in a Pop Warner football tournament, in “The Longshots.”

“I wanted to do this movie the second I read the script and saw that Ice Cube was attached,” says Durst. “This film has deep meaning…it’s special to me.”