New York Film Academy alumna, Issa Rae, star of the popular web series “The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl” and HBO’s upcoming series “Insecure,” has landed a two-year deal with the network. As part of the deal, Rae will help develop HBO programming across its stable of distribution channels, with a special focus on diversity.
Rae won a Shorty award for “Awkward Black Girl.” The series inspired both an essay collection of the same name as well as “Insecure,” which Rae stars in and is writing with Emmy award winner Larry Wilmore, previously of “The Daily Show” and his own “Nightly Show.”
In the show, Issa’s character works at a nonprofit for inner-city kids, where she is exhausted by her white co-workers, who treat her with a mix of condescension and curiosity. She shares the spotlight with her friend, corporate lawyer Molly (Yvonne Orji), and lives her boyfriend Lawrence (Jay Ellis).
“I want to make this very clear,” Rae said in a Time magazine interview. “This is not the quintessential black woman experience. It’s a very specific experience.”
Rae will become one of the few African American women to create and star in her own series. “It took me a while to realize that the way I am is black,” she said in a Glamour interview. “That being black is not just one thing. That no one could define my blackness, that I could make my own definitions of blackness. I can’t pinpoint the exact moment that happened, but I do know that realizing I don’t need to be limited instilled in me a new confidence.”
Be sure to check out her new series “Insecure” on HBO Sunday, Oct. 9, at 10:30 p.m.
Please note: NYFA does not represent that these are typical or guaranteed career outcomes. The success of our graduates in any chosen professional pathway depends on multiple factors, and the achievements of NYFA alumni are the result of their hard work, perseverance, talent and circumstances.