01
Y’lan Noel
HOMETOWN: Stone Mountain, Georgia
STREET CRED: Transferring from Morehouse College to New York University to study acting proved to be a life-changing move for Noel, who was an undeclared major at his HBCU. Finding his purpose led him to the indie flick House of Another and the TV shows The Hustle and Insecure, where he’s best known as Daniel, the bearded cutie in a complicated situationship with Issa Dee. This month Noel plays Dmitri, who kicks ass and takes names in The First Purge, the prequel to the social experiment started by shady New Founding Fathers of America. RESCUE 911: For Noel, playing a hero comes with a responsibility he doesn’t take lightly: “I had a wide array of emotions that I had never quite felt before. It was intense. So I would definitely want to continue to do something like this in the future because it fed me in a way like nothing else has really been able to feed me as an artist.”
02
Lil Rel Howery
HOMETOWN: Chicago, IL
STREET CRED: Howery may be our favorite TSA agent thanks to Get Out, but he doesn’t get any special treatment at LAX. That may change in
2018 because this is the comedian’s “Eddie Murphy year.” He has four movies about to drop—
including this month’s Uncle Drew, with Kyrie Irving and real-life friend Tiffany Haddish—plus he’s set to star in his own Fox sitcom, Rel, which is executive-produced by Jerrod Carmichael, his on-screen brother from The Carmichael Show. Prepare yourself for
the Chi-Town homie’s takeover by watching his hilarious Netflix stand-up, Kevin Hart Presents: LiL Rel: RELevent. LOVE LIFE: “I have three kids, so that filters out everybody. If you like me, you like me. I’d like to settle down and meet someone really dope. I had a good time, but now I want to chill out. Hopefully, I’ll meet the right woman who knocks my socks off and it will be like, ‘All right, you’re it.’ ”
03
Daveed Diggs
HOMETOWN: Oakland, CA
STREET CRED: After his Tony Award–winning performance in Hamilton, doors started opening for Diggs, including TV shows like The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, a recurring part as Bow’s brother Johan on black-ish and his first-ever movie role in Wonder. On July 20, Diggs and his lifelong homie Rafael Casal star in Blindspotting, a film they both wrote that examines the intersection of race and class in gentrified Oakland. GROWING PAINS: On the set of Wonder, Diggs deferred to child actors who were pros at #setlife: “It was a pretty humbling experience, coming from the greatest Broadway success story in recent memory…but that’s exactly how it should’ve been because I didn’t know what I was doing. I still don’t. I’m figuring it out. That’s why I love doing this.”
04
Jermaine Fowler
HOMETOWN: Hyattsville, Maryland
STREET CRED: After working on his stand-up skills in high school, Fowler headed to New York City at age 20 with his luggage and a dream. That dream became reality when he co-created and starred in the sketch comedy show Friends of the People and the Showtime special Jermaine Fowler: Give ’Em Hell Kid; he also starred in CBS’s Superior Donuts for two seasons. Now he’s in his first movie, Sorry to Bother You, as Salvador, an activist and a conscience to Cassius Green (Lakeith Stanfield), his friend who’s seduced by the trappings of a gigantic paycheck. “Some companies are unfair to their employees, and this movie disrupts all
of that,” says Fowler. “Salvador gives the telemarketing company what it deserves when it comes to union organizing and protesting. He finds his calling.” HUSTLIN’ SPIRIT: Back in the day, Fowler downloaded an illegal copy of the screenwriting software Final Draft. “I was broke as hell, and I didn’t want to write in Word because that’s unprofessional. Right now I have a legal copy—I’m doing everything legally and correctly—but sometimes you do what you gotta do. That hunger keeps you going.”
05
Rotimi
HOMETOWN: Maplewood, New Jersey
STREET CRED: Rotimi wanted to jump into the music biz after high school, but his African parents weren’t about that life. After graduating from Northwestern University in 2010, the “sexy Nigerian Butta-scotch” (see his alter ego in action on Instagram) racked up acting credits in TV shows like Boss. Now he’s best known for his role as backstabbing Andre “Dre” Coleman on Power (returning for season five on July 1). Fans finally get to see the motivation behind Dre’s sinister moves. “He’s doing everything Ghost did when he was 10 years younger,” says Rotimi. “He’s just doing it faster and smarter, and he doesn’t have any allegiance to anyone, so we’ll see who wins.” BEATS BY DRE: “Music is my first love,” says
the artist, who glides
between singing, acting and modeling. “Nothing touches how music makes people feel. You can listen to your favorite record a million times. It affects people when they’re working out, driving or when they’re mad or happy. It’s just a universal language. Being on Power is a very close second because I still feel like a rock star.”
06
Terence Nance
HOMETOWN: Dallas
STREET CRED: You know your film is the bomb when it snags a Gotham Award for Best Film Not Playing at a Theater Near You. That’s just one of the accolades Nance’s An Oversimplification of Her Beauty earned. On August 3, he’ll be getting more attention with the HBO project he created, Random Acts of Flyness. But know this ain’t your grandmama’s late-night TV show. Critics have described it as “a subversive look at the zeitgeist” because of the way it explores topics like gender fluidity, mourning and -violence. His distinct imprint is felt in each vignette because he writes, stars and directs the episodes. “I’ve always been interested in how to make media that has the potential to shift consciousness,” says Nance of his pride and joy. “I like having conversations that are honest, scary, funny and absurd.” THE NEW NEW: “There are some dope Black, Latino and Asian creators who you haven’t heard of before,” says the Brooklyn transplant about his colleagues. “If I want to see something new, I just call up the people I love and respect.”