That’s a far cry from not being able to afford a cup of coffee in the years after college. Born Jo-Issa Rae Diop in 1985, the star is named after her grandmothers, Joyce and Isseu, and grew up as the middle child of five to a pediatrician and a teacher. After a meteoric rise to fame following her web series The Misadventures of an Awkward Black Girl, Rae has not only starred on and produced her own HBO show; she’s also appeared in films like Little, The Hate U Give and The Lovebirds, the latter of which she also co-executive produced. (Her adorable costar on that project? The Big Sick and Eternals star Kumail Nanjiani.) She’s also got “reality-show producer” on her resumé thanks to, Sweet Life: Los Angeles, which premiered on HBO Max in the summer of 2021. She’ll even be turning up in the animated sequel Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse 2. As the final season of Insecure gets ready to premiere on Sun., Oct. 24, Rae’s said she’s not sure if she’s going to continue working both in front of and behind the camera. “I told myself I would never write and be in a show that I created again. It takes up a lot of your life, and I like to do a lot of things. I love doing this show. I’m so grateful to be able to do this show. But that’s just not really for me,” she said earlier this year. Rae admits that she’s “always thinking about work.” She even estimates that she has about 22 projects in development overall. “I was always like this," she says. “[In the past] it was like, ‘I need to work to make sure I have the means of affording a place to live.’ [Or], ‘This didn’t work, what’s the next thing I can do?’ I think that’s just how my mind works. That’s Capricorn st. Workaholic st.” So what makes Rae tick? Keep reading to find out the language some are surprised she knows, how she got started, why she insists on her privacy and what’s next for her. Here are answers to all your questions about Issa Rae.
What is Issa Rae’s nationality?
Rae was born in California; her mother is a teacher from Louisiana and her dad is a pediatrician from Senegal. The two met in France before marrying and welcoming three sons and two daughters (Rae is the middle child). The family lived in Senegal for a while before moving to Potomac, Maryland. There, Rae experienced “things that aren’t considered ‘Black,’ like the swim team and street hockey and Passover dinners with Jewish best friends. It was pretty much all downhill from there,” said told Stanford Magazine in 2012. The family moved to the South L.A. neighborhood of View Park before she was a teenager; the home they lived in was recently listed on the market for $1.1 million. Being bi-national presented some interesting issues. When she visited her Senegalese cousins, “because I was from L.A., they would ask me if we lived next door to movie stars. And they would all watch Baywatch. We would sit in a circle and watch Pamela Anderson. And then African-Americans here would always say, ‘Oh you’re African? Do you have a lion?’” She’s admitted to wanting a home in Senegal, where she was supposed to visit in 2020 before the pandemic.
How old is Issa Rae?
The star is 36 years old.
How tall is Issa Rae?
Rae may seem very tall, but she is only five-foot-eight.
How many languages does Issa Rae speak?
In addition to English, Rae speaks Wolof (the national language of Senegal) and French, which some people don’t expect. “I was walking in New York City one time, minding my own business, when I heard these obnoxious French guys behind me—and I realized they were talking about my butt and the way I walk! The instigator in me turned around and told them, in French, ‘Everybody speaks every language here, so be careful what you say.’ Then I strutted away.”
Who is Issa Rae’s husband?
Rae is notoriously private about her personal life. “I think the little time I’ve been in the industry, I’ve witnessed how so many people who are front-facing don’t have a peace and aren’t at peace, and that’s always been troubling to me,” she told Self in October 2021. “There’s something really nice to have a piece of me that no one knows about or no one can talk about except for the people that are part of my life. Self-care has been having a private piece that’s just for me.” So when she suddenly married businessmanLouis Diame in July 2021 (in the south of France!), it surprised a lot of people. The event was only attended by family and those close to Rae. “It was just a beautiful experience,” Rae told Tamron Hall. “People tell you that it goes by fast, and they’re right. But my thing was, it was a party. At the end of the day, it was just a big party. And it was a lot of fun.” However, she admits that she worked too much in the days leading up to the event and had to work too soon afterwards. “Coming back knowing that I had to go to work again and I was only out there a week was pretty devastating,” she recalled. Because she was known for being private, people were also surprised when she shared pictures from her nuptials online, including some showing off her Vera Wang gown. Why did she share those pics if she enjoys her privacy? “I still try to be private about my personal life, but that was something that I knew was going to be shared, and I just wanted to share it on my own terms,” she explained. Are there tiny Issa Raes in the future? She says she’s “extremely happy” being married but isn’t ready for kids right now. “I want to do as much as I can while I still can. I know it’s not the proper mentality to think that kids will slow you down, but I do feel that way… I like my life, I like this selfishness, and I know that I have a window. I’ve always felt that way, that women, Black women especially—unless you’re Viola Davis or Angela Bassett—you have a window when people are going to want to continue to see you and see what you can do.”
Where does Issa Rae live?
Issa Rae lives in a South Los Angeles neighborhood called View Park; she also grew up there. She enjoys getting up at 4 a.m. to take a walk around the neighborhood. “Waking up at four, I’m just like, ‘Not a lot of people are awake right now, at least on the West Coast,’ and that makes me feel like I have a window of time just for me. I think that’s my form of meditation, because I don’t meditate.” Rae also co-owns the Hilltop Coffee + Kitchen’s Inglewood location, not too far away. “Coffee shops facilitate productivity in so many ways; they facilitate collaboration. I’ve personally done all my writing in coffee shops. It always disappointed me that there weren’t any that were Black-owned or people-of-color-owned in my neighborhood,” she explained in a 2019 interview. “Now, to have the Inglewood location, I was just immensely proud because it’s home.’
How much does Issa Rae make?
While reports estimate that Rae’s worth is about $4 million, that number is about to go way up. Her new WarnerMedia deal is set to pay out $40 million over five years.
How did Issa Rae get her start?
After graduating from Stanford, Rae was working at nonprofits, freelancing and taking jobs here, there and everywhere when she hit upon the idea that would make her career. Rae was intensely frustrated with portrayals of black women in TV and movies. “I felt like my voice was missing, and the voices of other people that I really respect and admire and wanna see in the mainstream are missing,” she told HuffPost in 2013. That was when she started work on the web series that would become The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl. She wasn’t flush at the time, but she managed to get her dad to buy some equipment—that ended up getting stolen before she could use it! After the first few episodes, Rae and her partner on the show, Tracy Oliver, sought Kickstarter donations. They asked for $30,000, but made $56,269 in one month. “People surprised us. They were treating it like a movement and wanted to see us succeed,” Rae said at the time.
Did Issa Rae write Insecure?
Ultimately, HBO took an interest in Rae and her show; Insecure is loosely based on the web series. Rae has written and executive-produced the show throughout its run, along with other writers and producers. Among the things Rae likes most about the show is being able to present Black people in situations that aren’t always related to racism or trauma. “We always say internally in the room, it’s [about] being Black on a Tuesday. Those are the stories we’re telling.” The commitment to the truth of her characters went all the way up until the last episode. Just a couple of weeks before filming the finale, Rae wrote a letter to Prentice Penny and other producers saying that the finale they’d agreed on wasn’t right. “Thank God I had a burst of inspiration of what I wanted it to be, and that’s what we ended up shooting. I stand by it, I like it,” she told Entertainment Weekly. “The other one was good, too, but it just didn’t feel like the most [satisfying]. It didn’t feel like our show. I can’t wait to talk about it when it airs to see if I made the wrong decision.”
Did they cancel Insecure?
HBO never canceled Insecure; the show is simply ending this fall. Rae says she and Penny, the executive producer, thought five seasons was enough time to tell a complete story. As Rae once explained, “I knew, I’m like, ‘We’re gonna get tired of each other after maybe four years, five years. So let’s cut it short while we still love each other. “And we do, we love each other so much.” Penny agrees. “Every show has a DNA,” Penny told Entertainment Weekly. “We always looked at our show as, ‘It isn’t meant to be 90 episodes.’ We never wavered. I think we just felt that’s the right amount of time to tell these characters’ stories.”
What is Issa Rae’s new show about?
Sweet Life: Los Angeles premiered in August 2021. The reality show, which brings to mind The Hills or Laguna Beach, follows a fashion designer, a marketing specialist and others who “pursue their dreams in the heart of South Los Angeles, offering a unique and aspirational look at what it means to be young, Black, and full of ambition,” according to HBO. And that’s just the beginning. As of right now, Rae’s working on a Set It Off remake, a docuseries called Seen & Heard and a wrestling drama called Tre Cnt (which is being done with Dwayne Johnson’s own Seven Bucks company). There’s also a comedy, Rap S**t, in the works. But wait, there’s even more! Rae is slated to bring back HBO’s Project Greenlight, the docuseries about up-and-coming directors that first debuted in 2001 with Matt Damon and Ben Affleck. This version will follow female directors; Rae will appear as their mentor in each episode and will also executive produce.
Where can I watch Insecure and Sweet Life: Los Angeles?
The fifth and final season of Insecure will air on HBO and stream on HBO Max starting Sun., Oct. 24. Season 1 of Sweet Life: Los Angeles is available to stream now on HBO Max. Next, find out what we know about the rest of The Walking Dead’s 11th and final season!
