The work wives Issa Rae and Melina Matsoukas spill about the rules of working with your friends

Issa Rae and Melina Matsoukas – the hilarious and cool Insecure collaborators – spill about race, sex and the rules of working with your friends.

last year, I screened the pilot of Insecure, the HBO comedy about two best friends, Issa and Molly, who are unsettled and on the cusp of 30. In that episode, Issa takes Molly, who’s crying ‘tears of singleness’ to an open mic night to cheer her up – and proceeds to take the stage and perform a freestyle rap based on Molly’s inability to keep a guy. It kills. Like Molly, I was in my late 20s and aggressively single at the time, and I laugh-cried on my couch. Alone. On a Saturday night watching the scene. The girls are real, the writing is sharp, the jokes land and the look is lush.

So who’s behind all that magic? Issa Rae, 33, (who made a name for herself on Youtube with The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl) co-created the show with comedian Larry Wilmore and sold it to HBO when she was just 28. Issa – who writes, stars in and produces – then tapped fellow TV first-timer Melina Matsoukas, 37, known for music videos like Rihanna’s ‘ We Found Love’, to direct and later produce. (You can also thank Melina for directing Beyoncé’s ‘Formation’ video.) Together these two revolutionaries and fast friends have told a new kind of story about female identity and black female identity.

Now the series – which earned Issa her first Golden Globe nomination last year – is back in its second season. Fresh off a life-changing breakup, Issa Dee (Issa Rae) is running her vibrator out of batteries; meanwhile, power lawyer Molly Carter (Yvonne Orji) sees her world turned upside down after she opens a male colleague’s massive cheque by accident. Their friendship? It’s what’s holding them together.

As for Issa and Melina, they are as unstoppable as ever. How did this friendship and partnership come to be? ISSA I started out as a fan, watching Melina’s music videos. I put her name on the list for the show early on, but because she didn’t have experience in TV, it was kind of overlooked. Until it wasn’t, and HBO was like, “You want to take a risk? Who you do want?” MELINA I remember our first Skype call was terrible. But two days later we were in a room and we spoke the same language. We’re both black women navigating the world, having to code-switch, and figure out how and where we fit in. I There was a familiarity, “I don’t know you, but I know you.” After I left that meeting with Melina, I danced in the elevator. M I remember going to HBO and the president at the time [Michael Lombardo] was like, “We don’t normally do this.” Meaning: give a first-time creator, a first-time director and a first-time showrunner [Prentice Penny] an opportunity to do it together. “But let’s do it.” It was because of Issa that I was even in that room. She’s paving the way for young female filmmakers and filmmakers of colour. I Then we went to sushi – M She got me drunk. And wrote all my stories into seasons one and two! I You’re such a liar! I’d never really gotten a chance to work with someone who challenges while being collaborative. Especially being a woman of colour, sometimes it’s hard for us to put our foot down. You work with a lot of men and they’ll be like, “She has the reputation for being kind of a [makes a disapproving noise].” Melina knows what she wants and has an excellent reputation. M Issa is redefining the black female identity on TV. I don’t think we’ve ever seen a more basic character than Issa Dee. As black women, we can never just be regular – have flaws, be vulnerable, be a hypocrite, whatever. She’s shown us that person; I don’t know if we have seen that on TV before. Let’s talk about season two. Were there any tropes about female friendships that you were trying to disrupt with the show? I In a lot of the reality TV shows that I’m still a fan of, like Love & Hip Hop, Basketball Wives and The Real Housewives, there’s a lot of tension between women of colour. We live off the drama and the fights, but that’s not all female friendships. M We’re also showing that your soul mate is sometimes your best friend. That your female friendships can be just as fulfilling as [romantic] relationships, if not more. Referring to the part where Molly opens her white colleague’s cheque and sees how much more he’s

“We need stories that are different. Understanding about other people leads to acceptance, which is something that we need desperately.” – Melina Matsoukas