From the Booth to the Screen, The Best Rappers Turned Actors

The transition from rapping to acting is a hard one. And unfortunately, we’ve seen a number of rappers turn the big screen into a train wreck (shout out to 50 Cent). But of course there are the good ones, the ones who’ve managed to captivate both middle-America and Hip Hop America with their superb skills on the mic and their grace on the big and small screens. RefinedHype.com highlights the top rapper turned actors.

Tupac

Who can forget Tupac’s chilling role as Bishop in the film "Juice" or his role as the charming Lucky in "Poetic Justice"? Exactly. You can’t forget! And that, my friends, is exactly why Tupac is on this list. In the 90’s, Tupac had hip-hop heads swarming the box office to check him out on a whole ‘nother platform.

LL Cool J

LL Cool J is the epitome of the successful rapper turned actor. Hollywood adores this guy! Just recently, LL was added to the cast of the “NCIS” spin-off “NCIS: Los Angeles”. And although LL Cool J has definitely starred in his fair share of duds (Deep Blue Sea anyone?) I’m quite sure his acting resume will give any rapper a run for their money.

Ice T

If Tracy “Ice T” Marrow wasn’t killing it with his acting skills on “Law & Order: SVU” there’s no possible way he would have been on the show for nearly a decade. Aside from his role as Detective Tutuola on “Law & Order: SVU,” who can forget Ice T’s role in the classic film "New Jack City". Ice T has clearly come a long way since “Cop Killer”.

Eminem

Although his experience on both the big and small screen is limited to only one movie, I’m sure everyone can agree that Em murdered the role of Rabbit in "8 Mile". Of course, the role was loosely based on his real life, but we’ve seen rappers even fail at that (shout out to 50 Cent again).