 Fame & Fortune: Ice Cube
Pioneer rapper: Use money as a tool and cut liabilities
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It's amazing sometimes how the radical becomes mainstream.
If anyone could have been figured not to do business with "the
man," it was rapper Ice Cube, whose gangsta rap group N.W.A.
caused great controversy with an expletive-filled song.
But as Cube went solo and his popularity increased, Hollywood came
calling, and soon he was acting in films like "Boyz N the Hood,"
and writing and starring in the comedy film trilogy "Friday,"
"Next Friday" and "Friday After Next."
Ice Cube has since become an industry all his own,
as he raps, acts, and writes and produces both TV and film. While
he has signed to play the title role in the upcoming film remake
of "Welcome Back, Kotter," his most ambitious project
might have been the recent FX Networks' reality show "Black.
White." The show, for which Ice Cube served as executive producer,
took two families -- one black, one white -- and had a Hollywood
makeup artist disguise them as members of the other race. Then,
it sent them out into the world to experience life from a new perspective.
Between that show and the recent re-release of Ice Cube's first
four solo records, pop culture is getting a prime look at Ice at
the extreme stages of his career -- from angry young man to older
and wiser. Bankrate spoke to Ice Cube about the show, his career,
and life in the rap world.
Bankrate: How did you
come up for the idea for "Black.White."?
Ice Cube: It wasn't my
idea, it was the idea of the guy who's running FX, Jon Landgraf.
He brought R.J. Cutler and me and my company, Q Vision, to the table,
and asked if we could pull it off. I was real excited once I heard
what the idea was -- about how could we actually do it?
Bankrate: How have racial relations changed since you were a teenager?
Ice Cube: I just think people are a little more politically correct nowadays. It still exists in the same manner, because conditions where I come from don't change, they're actually getting worse. I just feel like, it's always kind of morphing into something new. But I have a distorted view because I'm a famous person, so people tend to be nice to me. As a teenager, I was confronted with it a lot more than I have been in the last 20 years.
Bankrate: Was there any aspect of the show that surprised you?
Ice Cube: Actually, no.
Things made me laugh, but not really surprised me. When we put the
show together and let the cameras roll, we didn't know what we were
going to get. All we could do was set up situations, opportunities
and places we think racism hides, and we kind of let it roll.
Bankrate: Does the way you approached this show mark any sort of evolution in your views on race from what they were in the N.W.A. days?
Ice Cube: Could be. With maturity, hopefully you get more understanding. I don't think things are better than it was. I think we have a little more understanding of each other, that's good. That's a start to me, understanding.
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