The Genius of Jordan Peele

For our February cover story, Jordan Peele took senior writer Brian Hiatt to Universal Studios Hollywood, where the pair rode the Harry Potter ride, shared butterbeers, and talked about Peele’s rise from sketch-comedy star to one of Hollywood’s most important directors. The story [“The All-American Nightmares of Jordan Peele,” RS 1324] was the first significant piece of press Peele did for Us, the highly anticipated, extremely terrifying follow-up to his Oscar-winning 2016 debut, Get Out. Peele also talked about his upbringing, race and the Twilight Zone reboot he’s executive-producing. Readers responded: “Jordan Peele emerging as one of our most important mass-entertainment artists is one of my favorite developments of the last couple of years,” tweeted Adam Lehrer. Others, like Scott Moeller, joined in on the praise, tweeting that Peele has “brought suspense and horror [and] storytelling to the next level.” Another reader, Erica Russell, tweeted that her favorite thing was “learning about his goth phase and affinity for butterbeer.” One tweet, by Bibine, summarized many readers’ feelings: “Man, what a great surprise he turned out to be. Not only is he funny, but he’s scary as hell.”

“I never would’ve thought I’d say...that Jordan Peele would be on his way to becoming the black Hitchcock. What a time to be alive.”

—CJ Baldwin, via the internet