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Emma McIntyre/WireImage
Issa Rae is blunt about how the entertainment industry appears to be changing.
in a time interview Today, he responded to an industry he feels is now being driven by considerations other than creativity and inclusivity.
A big part of that attitude is their recent history. In January, his television series Rap shit! was fired by Warner Bros. Discovery. It was just part of a disturbing trend in Rae’s eyes. “I’ve never seen Hollywood so scared and clueless, and at the mercy of Wall Street,” she says.
Last year was a rollercoaster for Rae. She won a Peabody Trailblazer Award, was in acclaimed films Barbie and American fictionand launched the second season of his critically acclaimed show Max, Rap shit!
But he also had to lay off eight employees during the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes, and saw Rap shit! cancelled. This has been a stark reminder to Rae of the golden rule: he who has the gold rules.
Still, Rae is hatching big plans for a better 2024. She’s developing at least two new projects for HBO. She is also working to build a study campus in South Los Angeles.
But the lessons learned are never far from his thoughts.
Rae thinks there is no way Rap shit! WarnerMedia reportedly gave the green light today, as executives seek reassurance rather than nervousness. Rae sees that as a danger to earlier promises of greater diversity and representation. “There is a bitterness of who suffers because you retreat? People of color always do it,” she says.
In previous times, Rae says, executives mostly stayed away from creative decisions. “Now these conglomerate leaders are also making decisions about Hollywood. You are not creative people. Stick to the money,” she says. “The people who are taking risks are on platforms like TikTok: that’s what attracts the attention of young people. “Then you are killing your own industry.”
Rae has vowed to maintain her advantage, even as she acknowledges the winds of change.
“When you have all these streaming services competing with each other, it means that they are also changing the objectives of what success looks like and what their brand is. It’s all mush,” she says. “I know what my brand identity is and what I want to do. But if that doesn’t align with who pays me to do things, then it’s complex. We are malleable, but only to a certain point.”