Issa Rae joined Stephen A. Smith to discuss her rise to becoming a powerhouse in the entertainment industry and why she prides herself on authentically representing Black culture in all of her projects in the latest episode of The Stephen A. Smith Show.
LISTEN NOW: The Stephen A. Smith Show - Issa Rae Interview
From the creator and star of the YouTube series, Awkward Black Girl, to a very successful actress, writer and executive producer on a slew of projects, Issa says "I'm living my dream right now." She continues, "I'm just trying to do as much as I can while I still have it," before talking about some of her latest projects.
When she thinks about what she loves the most about her career, it's the fact that her possibilities for career growth are seemingly endless for her. "Honestly, the possibility feel kinda' endless to me," she said before revealing that sometimes "there's something frightening about that" as it sometimes "stifles" her.
She explains feeling that she still has something to prove even though she has already achieved so much. "I'm a Black woman in this industry where there's constant change," she says, "I don't take that lightly. I have seen different iterations of Black people succeeding in the industry and then you never see them again or then you know they have to like fight to get money to make their next project. So I will never feel comfortable where I'm at."
Starting her career, she admitted that Diddy, Ellen DeGeneres, and Oprah Winfrey were her "blueprint" she said. "I just loved how they've been able to be themselves and touch so many different parts of the industry." She added that she also has much respect for Shonda Rhimes who is "constantly proving herself and being doubted."
"I love us, I love our stories, I was raised on our stories, I was raised on our images and I just find us so beautiful, and every iteration of us... I saw what it looked like when we weren't here," Issa said when talking about what it was that inspired her to curate content about Black people and their experiences. "To be in a position where I can elevate us, give us opportunities, like that is the most fulfilling thing ever to me," she said.
It's important to her that she creates with Black people in mind because for so long they were not. "There's an unapologetic nature that I fiercely get behind," she said but that doesn't make her work exclusively for Black people. "That's not to say that I'm exclusive in anyway but I primarily think about us."
Listen to the full conversation between Issa Rae and Stephen A. Smith where he praises her for all of her work and business ventures above and on the free Audacy app.
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