Raising Kanan's Malcolm Mays reveals how much Diddy inspired his Lou-Lou character in season 2
The wait is almost over - ‘Power Book: Raising Kanan’ season two is coming through blazing on STARZ this weekend - Sunday, August 14 to be technical - and considering how things wrapped up, there’s a lot of questions needing immediate answers. In an effort to calm your nerves, show star Malcolm ‘Lou-Lou’ Mays comes through clutch for Attack The Culture to talk about this year’s expectations, his real-life music career and industry icon Diddy trying to sign him plus keeping things going from his ‘Snowfall’ run to his new journey in the ‘Power Universe’ with Courtney Kemp and Sascha Penn drawing up the plays.
The discussion hits different with Malcolm reminding us STARZ not only is the best premium network in the game but vowing to have the best ‘Power Book’ series - sorry Joseph ‘Tommy Egan’ Sikora and the ‘Power Book IV: Force’ crew.
Buckle up for some of Malcolm’s highlights below and keep scrolling to check out the full chop up session.
We’ve seen you in the 80’s in ‘Snowfall.’ We’ve seen you in the ‘90’s with ‘Raising Kanan.’ Are we going to the 70’s or the 2000’s next? What’s lining up next?
Malcom Mays: [laughs] God willing, man. God willing. There’s some things I’ve got in the works. There’s a movie Intercepted I wrote with the late John Singleton, meant to direct, rest in peace and now hopefully I’ll be directing that Drake is producing that is based on a story of a football player named Darryl Henley that’s set in the mid to late 90’s so I’m getting closer to the 2000’s. [laughs]
Season two, man. Have you’ve been able to exhale because before we even got to season one, we got the renewal. So you couldn’t relax too long. We knew that boom, we’re going to start shooting immediately, right. Now season two is finally right here for the world to see, can you exhale a little bit or no?
Malcolm Mays: Of course. I think we’ve been blessed enough to know what’s happening and what’s coming and what’s next. Honestly, I ain’t never really held my breath. I was just telling somebody else like, bro, this life isn’t promised. I’m just glad to be on a really good ship. I’m blessed. I don’t stress about shit. This is more money than I was supposed to even have anyway.
How dope is it with your character Lou-Lou, because obviously people who know about your background, they know you’re a musician and you put out that EP not too long ago, you’ve rubbed elbows with Diddy’s son Quincy, you might have picked up a couple Diddy gems here and there, let’s talk about Lou-Lou’s transition into this role.
Malcolm Mays: Funny enough, Diddy tried to sign me. He’s one of the first people that tried to sign me. Yeah. Diddy. It’s so funny because with this character, I pulled a lot from his characterization. People don’t know, Diddy was really out here, bro. Diddy was really in the street like that. You feel me?
He wasn’t necessarily like all [in] but he did that thing. So having that kind of dual lifestyle that we all know Diddy lived was kind of an inspiration.
Check out the full interview with Malcom Mays below and reminder the new season will debut on Sunday, August 14 at midnight on the STARZ app, all STARZ streaming, and on-demand platforms and internationally on the STARZPLAY premium streaming platform across Europe, Latin America and Japan. On linear, it will debut on STARZ at 9pm ET/PT in the U.S. and Canada. New episodes will premiere every Sunday at 9pm ET/PT.