Boots Riley: Last News

Daniel D'Addario Chief TV Critic “Sorry to Bother You,” Boots Riley’s 2018 directorial debut, was a cultural event: It announced Riley, who’d already made a career as a politically minded rapper, as a sharp critic of contemporary capitalism who could pair his ideas with grabby, memorable imagery. The cascade of reveals and visual transformations toward the end of that film, too good to spoil for the uninitiated, worked brilliantly as spectacle and made Riley’s case too: Under our current system, we all end up becoming beasts of burden.  Riley returns with a larger canvas and new expressions of familiar concerns with “I’m a Virgo.” Like “Sorry to Bother You,” which addressed the problems of its telemarketer characters, this series merges the prosaic with the surreal. On “I’m a Virgo,” we follow a 13-foot-tall man trying to figure out where he fits into his community and into the ongoing struggle for a fairer future. As played by Jharrel Jerome (of “Moonlight” and an Emmy winner for “When They See Us”), the massive fellow known as Cootie is taciturn, shy — understandably out of place. To work out, he bench-presses an entire car; his aunt and uncle (Mike Epps and Carmen Ejogo), raising him in their Oakland home despite being people of more typical stature, fret over how much food it takes to keep their nephew alive.

Jonathan Majors and Magazine Dreams flexed some big muscles tonight at the drama’s Sundance Film Festival premiere with the actor drawing a standing ovation.

If you’ve seen the 2018 film, “Sorry to Bother You,” then you’re probably well aware that filmmaker Boots Riley is not a timid filmmaker. In his debut feature, the writer-director mixed bright colors and absurdist visuals to create a satire that is wholly unique and thoroughly entertaining.

When They See Us star Jharrel Jerome is helping to bring the story to life onscreen.Riley’s genius brought us 2018’s Sorry to Bother You, and now two years later, his new show I’m a Virgo, centers on a “13-ft tall Black man who lives in Oakland.” “It’ll be dark, absurd, hilarious, and important,” Riley wrote in an Instagram post about the show, which is being created with Michael Ellenberg’s production company Media Res. I’m A Virgo is the first leap into television for the rapper, producer, writer and director. Riely is best known for his two-decade span as leader of The Coup, a radical funk/punk/hip-hop band, where he penned six albums.