An Oakland Rapper-Turned-Screenwriter Returns to the Bay Area

When Saeed Crumpler comes to the Bay Area this weekend for the BraveMaker Film Festival, he’ll be returning to the soil that launched an unlikely journey.

For 20 years, the Oakland-raised Crumpler rapped under the stage name Balance, making music with Kendrick Lamar and Traxamillion before flipping the script in 2021 to become a full-time television and film writer.

On Saturday, Crumpler appears alongside podcast host Hilliard Guess at the film festival’s Screenwriters’ Rant Room “Live” Roundtable to discuss his unconventional path to Hollywood and unique approach to the industry.

Running July 10–13 in Redwood City, the BraveMaker Film Festival includes more than 90 film screenings, a dozen workshops and multiple panel discussions ranging from lighting techniques to character development. Founded by Redwood City’s own Tony Gapastione, the festival brings together Bay Area writers, filmmakers and actors to showcase their talents.

Gapastione says such platforms are important, particularly now, as Hollywood makes post-writers strike adjustments and simultaneously recovers from this year’s massive fires. Those challenges have been echoed by Governor Newsom, who last week signed a bill more than doubling the annual funding of California’s film and television tax credit program.

The schedule for this year’s BraveMaker Film Festival includes a variety of films, including a handful from East Bay screenwriters, like Kristina Thomas (Saving All My Love), Nijla Mu’min (Noor) and D’Angelo “D’Lo” Louis (Shoebox). Social events include a Saturday afternoon mixer hosted by Bay Area actor Belgica Rodriguez.

Prior to his rap career, Crumpler studied film at San Francisco State, and a decade ago he took a screenwriting class. But he sincerely champions the fellowship route, which led to him working on the Starz series Blindspotting and MTV’s Hip Hop Family Christmas.

In 2021, while still rapping, Crumpler got accepted to the Nickelodeon Writing Program. He shadowed writers and worked across Paramount Pictures’ many subsidiaries. Once his foot was in the door, Crumpler went right in.

“I wrote an episode of a Nickelodeon show called Blaze and the Monster Machines, which my nephew, he’s three, loves,” Crumpler says. Simultaneously, he wrote Flatbush Misdemeanors, “an R-rated comedy that takes place in Flatbush, New York.”

Within a year, Crumpler signed a first-look deal with Sony Pictures Television, where he’s currently at work on several projects. “I’ve got an animated show, got a comedy, and we’ve got like two dramas,” says Crumpler. “All of them take place pretty much in the Bay Area.”

The lack of Bay Area representation in TV and film pushed Crumpler to focus on hometown stories, he says, noting that he’s also written a number of unreleased movies, including a biopic on Mac Dre.

Ahead of Saturday’s conversation, Crumpler, who lives in Los Angeles, offered some advice to storytellers looking to get into the industry.

Hollywood is indeed in flux, he says. It’s not as easy to film in Southern California as it once was, but the industry hub is still there. And while he’s a proponent of the fellowship route, he sees potential for indie television and filmmakers. It’s not exactly the same as the independent rap game in the Bay Area — where artists both make and distribute their art — but there are some parallels, he says.

“Instead of trying to make a movie for five thousand dollars,” Crumpler suggests, “try to make a three-minute trailer for the movie,” adding that filmmakers can take that as proof of concept to investors; it’s all about making a small iteration of an idea in order to show it to the world.

“As an independent creator, your benefit is, you don’t have anybody trying to change your ideas,” he says. “Being an independent creative, you can just create and put it out without a filter. And sometimes those things take off.”

This weekend, Redwood City will be full of creatives looking to launch their ideas into the world.

The BraveMaker Film Festival takes place July 10–13 at various venues in downtown Redwood City. Details here.