Five Movies You Didn’t Know Were Produced By Rappers

To celebrate the launch of Chris Rock’s new film Top Five, we’re looking at five rappers who have proved there’s more than one string to their bow with successful forays into the movie business.

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Hip-hop’s biggest stars have always been some of the most charismatic and fascinating figures in pop culture. It’s why the last 25 years of film is littered with rappers-turned-actors; from Tupac Shakur to Eminem, they bring an electric authenticity to their work on-screen. But not only that, many have now moved behind the cameras to produce films that speak to them, routinely taking their careers in unexpected directions. Here are just five that have turned their gifts to helping produce feature films for the big screen.

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Jay Z, Annie (2014)

Last year one of the biggest names in the history of rap helped usher in a remake of the famous Broadway musical Annie. Starring Oscar-nominee Quvenzhané Wallis and Jamie Foxx, the film wasn’t as well received as John Huston’s version from 1982, but being one of the only films of recent time aimed squarely at girls – and specifically at African American girls at that – made it a hit at the box office.

The famous songs that audiences know and love like “Tomorrow”, “You’re Never Fully Dressed Without a Smile”, and “It’s a Hard Knock Life” – which Jay Z famously twisted into his beloved “Hard Knock Life (Ghetto Anthem)” from 1998’s Vol. 2… Hard Knock Life – are given modern, spunky upheavals from Australian music star Sia, who also wrote three new tunes including the Golden Globe-nominated “Opportunity”. No doubt spurred on by his recent fatherhood as well as his desire to spread Annie’s “story of hope,” Annie is a valiant effort by Jay Z to give young black girls their own version of a classic about never giving up.

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Queen Latifah, Just Wright (2010)

Dana Owens is one of the most successful rapper-turned-actors in the business. From her beginnings with iconic track “U.N.I.T.Y.” to an Oscar nomination for her role as prison warden Mama Morten in Chicago (2002), Queen Latifah, as Owens is more commonly known, has even recently made the journey into talk show television.

Before that, however, she has stepped behind the scenes to produce several films including Beauty Shop (2005), and has recently been behind the made-for-TV movie adaptation of Steel Magnolias (2012) and the upcoming Bessie Smith biopic Bessie (2015) alongside Mo’Nique. One of her most impressive producing achievements is Just Wright (2010), a romantic comedy that takes the blueprint of the genre, one usually filled with white actors of unrealistic beauty standards. Just Wright surprises, thanks to its spot-on casting of Latifah alongside fellow rapper/actor Common, and the way it shows a woman that an underserved segment of the population can relate to, while also giving roles to under-utilised actors like Pam Grier and Phylicia Rashad. In his positive review, Roger Ebert hailed the film and noted that “[o]ne reason people like Queen Latifah is that she likes herself. In most of her roles, she radiates cheer.”

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Raekwon, Black & White (1999)

The esteemed Corey Woods, known best as Wu-Tang Clan’s Raekwon, was pivotal in the making of James Toback’s Black & White. This all-star drama about race, class, sexuality, and culture features Robert Downey Jr, Ben Stiller, Gaby Hoffman, Jared Leto, Elijah Wood, Brooke Shields, and members of Wu-Tang Clan as well as Fredro Starr and Sticky Fingaz from hip-hop outfit Onyx. The film also has an appearance by Mike Tyson as himself, a role that would figure prominently in the next film on the list.

Confronting and edited down to avoid a restrictive rating, Black and White was criticised by the likes of Variety as “never really deliver[ing] upon” the expectations that the “live and amusing” film sets up. Roger Ebert, however, praised the improvised nature of the project, observing that “for musicians like Wu-Tang Clan, their language is their art form, so he didn’t write a lot of the movie’s dialogue.” Marketed as being predominantly about white youth who imitate black culture long before thinkpieces about Iggy Azalea’s appropriation of hip-hop were a concept, it’s more than that and instead shows the way society views people of different races, even if it does so on its own unsubtle black-and-white terms.

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Nas, Tyson (2009)

While many hip-hop stars have produced documentaries about hip-hop – for starters there is Ice-T’s Something from Nothing: The Art of Rap (2012), Ludacris’ ATL: The Untold Story of Atlanta’s Rise in the Rap Game (2014), Snoop Dogg’s Uprising: Hip Hop and the L.A. Riots (2012) – but with Tyson, the performer of the iconic Illmatic album moved behind the scenes to help produce this documentary about boxer and controversy-magnate Mike Tyson.

Again directed by James Toback, Tyson was much better reviewed and had its world premiere at the prestigious Cannes Film Festival where it won the Un Certain Regard Knockout Award. It would go on to be a hit at the box office and be nominated for a long list of awards from critics. Like the journalist character of Top Five, Tyson seeks to expose its subject with frank, candid look at a talking-point figure. The Washington Times hailed it as “utterly absorbing and fascinating,” while Margaret Pomeranz from At the Movies stated that she “actually found it very moving.” Nas recorded a song for the Tyson soundtrack called “Legendary”.

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Adam Yauch, Oscilloscope Laboratories

The Beastie Boys’ “MCA” co-founded Oscilloscope Laboratories, a film production and distribution company, in 2008 with David Fenkel. The company, based out of the late rapper’s native New York City, has been responsible for releasing some of the most acclaimed films of the last few years including Wendy and Lucy (2008), Exit Through the Gift Shop (2010), Wuthering Heights (2011), and We Need to Talk About Kevin (2012).

As a producer he specifically worked on The Beastie Boys’ audience-directed concert film Awesome; I Fuckin’ Shot That! (2006) and the acclaimed sports documentary Gunnin’ for That #1 Spot (2008). That film, which Yauch also directed, followed eight of America’s top high school basketballers as they compete for the Elite 24 Hoops Classic championship, all eight of which were eventually drafted in the NBA. The soundtrack featured songs by Jay Z, NWA, House of Pain, MIA, and The Beastie Boys. It was hailed as “a tribute to the game and its accessibility to all”, and as “a refreshing and thrilling reminder of why we watch and why we play.”

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Top Five, starring Chris Rock and Rosario Dawson, tells the story of New York City comedian-turned-film star Andre Allen, whose unexpected encounter with a journalist (Rosario Dawson) forces him to confront the comedy career—and the past—that he’s left behind. The film was co-produced by Shawn “Jay Z” Carter and Kanye West with the Executive Music Producer being Questlove, and hits cinemas on March 12. Click here to win tickets to an exclusive screening. 

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Glenn Dunks is a freelance writer from Melbourne who is currently based in New York City. He also works as an editor and a film festival programmer while tweeting too much @glenndunks.