Power season 5: Why Kendrick Lamar is appearing; why other rappers don’t

On Sunday’s episode of Power season 5, you are getting a chance to see rapper Kendrick Lamar in a pretty important role. He is the biggest casting that the show has done, and what’s just as remarkable as the rapper being cast is the fact that the producers kept it a secret for so long. After all, the news of Lamar’s cast was only revealed a number of days ago! That’s despite filming for this episode being many months the past.

So why haven’t we seen more rappers on Power in general, especially since 50 Cent is an executive producer on the show? Apparently, there are some others that have expressed an interest on the series over the years. Yet, not everyone is right for the show, largely because there are often only so many parts that people want to play.

Speaking via Entertainment Weekly, show executive producer Courtney A. Kemp had the following to say on this particular subject:

“Everyone always wants to play the same part. They all wanna play gangsters … They all wanna come in and be a power play, like a drug-dealing gangster. And, I’m like, ‘That’s not interesting.’ Nobody cares about rapper A playing that, because they’ve seen him play that in at least a million music videos. Or they’re rapping about it. It’s not that interesting.”

Kemp added that what made Lamar different is that he wanted to challenge himself and take on a role that would push him in some different directions. It seems as though he took this from an actor point of view rather than just a way for him to get headlines. This does make us wonder if there are some more acting appearances for him beyond this show — we do think that there are going to be some other people interested in hiring him in the weeks and months to come.

Related – Check out some other news about Power, including a review for tonight’s episode coming later

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