Riley's Coup

How an Oakland rapper made a film about race and class and rapacious capitalism that millions will pay to see

- Michael Mechanic

AN HOUR BEFORE showtime at a mid-April premiere of Sorry to Bother You at Oakland’s Grand Lake Theatre, moviegoers were already lined up down the block on either side of the marquee. “What’s this for?” asked a passerby. “Star Wars,” someone joked.

Inside the historic theater, sporting a ’70s-era navy blue suit, Raymond “Boots” Riley, first-time director and longtime frontman for eclectic hip-hop group the Coup, came out to introduce his film, which hits theaters July 6 and is shaping up to be a success story in the vein of Jordan Peele’s Get Out. The showing was part of the San Francisco International Film Festival, which hadn’t used the Grand Lake before this year, but Riley had insisted. He saw Star Wars here as a kid—“the real one”—and the 1985 Krush Groove premiere: “Sheila E. was like right there.”

Riley, 47, has been a visible icon of East Bay culture and activism for such a long time that it’s hard to imagine he wasn’t born with his trademark Afro and muttonchops.