Completely Not Fake Hollywood Stories: Aaron McGruder (The Creator of the Boondocks)

I’m no baller, but over the course of the last several years I have had many interactions with the rich and the famous. Of course, most times nothing really spectacular happens. Famous people after all, are just regular people like you and me. (Well, some of them are regular, others are either extremely short or pretentious buttheads…but I digress.)

But there has been one or two times when I have been kicking it with a baller and something really cool happens. Like the time I almost got beat up at Death Row’s corporate office or the time ?uestlove told me that he’d “rather spin records than do coke.” (I think he was trying to say he likes to DJ because it keeps his mind busy, but ?uestlove is a bigger nerd than me so it was sort of hard to interpret what he was saying.)

So in the spirit of Charlie Murphy and Rick James, every now and then I plan to drop a blog about one of my Completely Not Fake Hollywood Stories. Heck, if Eddie’s little brother can get famous retelling his big bro’s experiences why can’t I get some blog traffic telling mine.

After the jump is a Completely Not Fake Hollywood Story about the legendary cartoonist Aaron McGruder.

A couple years ago I was an intern in this summer internship program that taught college students how to be effective community organizers. I really liked the program, especially because every weekend we went on a field trip to protest corporate bad guys who weren’t paying their employees or what have you.

This one time we were outside of the Beverly Center in Los Angeles protesting the unfair treatment of mall janitors, and it was hot as a bond fire outside. After about an hour of yelling and sign waving our group was getting ready to pack it up and head to the bar when Aaron McGruder stopped at our intersection.

Now, I’m sure most people didn’t even recognize the guy. After all Boondocks was still only a comic strip at the time and McGruder hadn’t quite blown up yet. (And it didn’t help that Aaron McGruder actually looks like every other neo-soul light skinned dude on the planet.) But me, being the nerd that I am, immediately recognized him. So I tested his gangsta.

“Hey Brother McGruder,” I said with swag as I tapped on his window. “Why don’t you come out here and join us.” (You know I emphasized the brother to make it seem like I was super down.)

Of course, I didn’t really expect him to get out of his whip, after all he was driving a baller Benz and we, well…we were just some ish talking kids who had been standing in the sun all day. But I was wrong, I could tell by the smirk on his face that he was excited by our energy and felt comfortable enough to lower the glass protecting him from us.

“Sure, thanks for asking. Let me go park my car and I’ll be right back”

I was shocked!! Here was one of the most well known dudes in the hip-hop generation saying that he was going to protest with us and there were no cameras and no publicists in sight. He was just interested in our issue.

We were immediately reenergized

After about another hour of chanting “Si, Se Puede” and shouting at cops and nervous mall staff, a seemingly giddy McGruder came up to me and said. “This is really cool , thanks for asking me to come out here. I gotta run now, but here’s my card, call me the next time you guys are out here.”

Now I never called him, as we never went back to the Beverly Center and I’m way too cool to be a groupie , but I always thought it was cool that this guy stopped to kick it with us. I mean, most people in Hollywood are too self absorbed to actually care about janitors or sweaty activists. But not Aaron McGruder, he is really a righteous ass dude.

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Biko Baker