50 Fun Facts About Childish Gambino

Childish Gambino took his stage name from an online name generator themed on which hip-hop group?

Wu-Tang Clan gave the generator its theme, and Glover kept the name it produced for his first released mixtape, Sick Boi, in 2008.

Donald Glover's high school yearbook voted him most likely to write for which animated TV series?

The Simpsons was his classmates' prediction, and a spec script he wrote for that very show later helped win him his first job in a TV writers' room.

Childish Gambino released This Is America in May 2018 on the same evening he hosted which TV show?

Saturday Night Live had Glover as both host and musical guest that night, and the song went on to enter the Billboard Hot 100 at number one.

Childish Gambino's song Redbone plays near the start of which 2017 film?

Get Out, directed by Jordan Peele, plays the song as its hero Chris is introduced, and months later Redbone re-entered the Hot 100 and climbed to number 12.

Donald Glover played a younger version of which Star Wars character in a 2018 spin-off film?

Lando Calrissian was first played by Billy Dee Williams, who met Glover to pass on advice before the younger actor took over the role.

Which character did Donald Glover voice in Disney's 2019 remake of The Lion King?

Simba is voiced by Glover as an adult lion, and he asked to redo his lines after his father's death made the story feel more personal.

Donald Glover played which former high school football star on the NBC sitcom Community?

Troy Barnes appeared in every season until the fifth, when Glover left after five episodes to make room for projects of his own.

Which singer co-stars as Kofi opposite Donald Glover in the 2019 musical film Guava Island?

Rihanna plays Kofi, girlfriend of Glover's musician Deni, and one critic was disappointed that she never sings in it.

Donald Glover in Spider-Man pajamas on Community influenced the look of which Marvel Comics hero?

Miles Morales made his comics debut in 2011, and Glover later voiced the character in the animated series Ultimate Spider-Man.

Childish Gambino dances shirtless through what kind of building in the This Is America music video?

A warehouse is the backdrop, and the video's mix of dancing and sudden violence drew about 12.9 million views in 24 hours.

Which filmmaker, a frequent Donald Glover collaborator, directed the This Is America music video?

Hiro Murai won the Grammy for Best Music Video for it, and said the films Mother! and City of God were his inspirations.

This Is America by Childish Gambino was the first rap song to win the songwriting Grammy and which other award?

Record of the Year and Song of the Year both went to the single, which won in all four categories it was nominated for.

Which R&B singer makes a cameo sitting on a car late in Childish Gambino's This Is America video?

SZA appears perched on one of the old cars that fill the set, many shown with hazard lights flashing and the driver's door ajar.

Which rapper earned a writing credit on Childish Gambino's This Is America by supplying its outro?

Young Thug sings the closing section, while the other ad-libs come from a guest list that includes Quavo and 21 Savage.

Which Rwandan-born choreographer devised the dances in Childish Gambino's This Is America video?

Sherrie Silver drew on African dances such as Ghana's Azonto and South Africa's Gwara gwara, and won an MTV Video Music Award for the work.

Donald Glover told GQ that This Is America began as a joking diss aimed at which rapper?

Drake was the target of the original joke, and the finished single ended up replacing his own hit Nice for What at number one.

The cover of Childish Gambino's Awaken, My Love! nods to the 1971 album Maggot Brain by which group?

Funkadelic shaped the sound as well as the sleeve: the album swaps rapping for psychedelic funk, and its track Riot samples the group.

The vinyl edition of Childish Gambino's Awaken, My Love! came with which piece of technology?

A VR headset came with the album, letting owners use an app to watch immersive performances from his Pharos concerts.

Childish Gambino debuted Awaken, My Love! at three 2016 concerts in which California desert spot?

Joshua Tree hosted the shows almost three months before the album came out, with fans led there by a countdown app Glover released.

Childish Gambino's Redbone is based on the song I'd Rather Be with You by which funk outfit?

Bootsy's Rubber Band supplied the template, but the high vocal is Glover's natural singing: he said no pitch-shifting was used on the album.

Which single from Because the Internet became Childish Gambino's first entry on the Billboard Hot 100?

3005 peaked at number 64, and its video is one long take of Gambino riding a Ferris wheel beside a teddy bear.

Childish Gambino recorded most of Because the Internet in a rented mansion owned by which NBA player?

Chris Bosh owned the Los Angeles mansion, which Gambino nicknamed The Temple and ran with house rules that banned shoes, tweeting and Instagram.

Childish Gambino released what kind of written companion piece to sync with his album Because the Internet?

A screenplay of 72 pages told the story of The Boy, who lives in a mansion and spends his days tweeting at celebrities.

Which artist guests on The Worst Guys, a track on Childish Gambino's album Because the Internet?

Chance the Rapper also turns up in the album's prelude short film, where he loses a game of Connect Four to Trinidad James.

Which 2011 album was Childish Gambino's studio debut, featuring the singles Bonfire and Heartbeat?

Camp entered the Billboard 200 at number 11 and was his first release on a label after years of giving mixtapes away free.

Which label signed Childish Gambino in 2011 and went on to release his first three studio albums?

Glassnote founder Daniel Glass praised Glover's rock'n'roll irreverence when he signed him; the rapper moved to RCA in 2018.

Which Hawaiian island gives its name to a 2014 Childish Gambino EP whose proceeds went toward preserving it?

Kauai is where the story's hero wakes up: the companion mixtape, released a day earlier, is all a dream about running his home city.

Which Childish Gambino single has a video of Donald Glover dancing to impress a woman in a take-out restaurant?

Sober won an mtvU Woodie Award for its video, which plays like Michael Jackson's The Way You Make Me Feel with a different outcome.

Which Childish Gambino song has an animated video in which he walks past cartoon versions of famous musicians?

Feels Like Summer sets its celebrity cameos, Michael Jackson and Beyoncé among them, against lyrics that worry about climate change.

Most song titles on Childish Gambino's 2020 release 3.15.20 are numbers that indicate what about each track?

Its start time on the album names each track, so 12.38 begins 12 minutes and 38 seconds in; only two songs got ordinary titles.

Which composer, who scored the sitcom Community, co-produced Childish Gambino's first three studio albums?

Ludwig Göransson became Glover's most frequent collaborator and later won Academy Awards for scoring Black Panther and Oppenheimer.

Under what new title did Childish Gambino reissue a finished version of his album 3.15.20 in May 2024?

Atavista gave every track a proper title and added new guests, and Glover admitted the original had been rushed out as the pandemic began.

Which guitar-driven rock song was the lead single from Childish Gambino's final album, Bando Stone & the New World?

Lithonia is named after a city in Georgia, and its video puts actor Alex Wolff behind the drum kit.

Childish Gambino's 2024 song Can You Feel Me samples an alphabet song from which children's TV show?

Sesame Street supplied African Alphabet, a number sung with Kermit, and the track also features Glover's own son, Legend.

Which pop star sings on Time, a track from Childish Gambino's 2020 album 3.15.20?

Ariana Grande joined a song that fans first heard a year earlier, when Time appeared, still unreleased, in Glover's film Guava Island.

Donald Glover and his co-star secretly filmed the 2019 musical Guava Island in which Caribbean country?

Cuba hosted the secret shoot in mid-2018, and the film premiered at Coachella on the weekend Glover headlined the festival.

Donald Glover was born on a California air force base but grew up in which Georgia town?

Stone Mountain later gave a 2014 mixtape its title, with Glover stripping out the vowels to spell STN MTN.

Donald Glover earned a degree in dramatic writing in 2006 from which school?

New York University is where he joined the sketch troupe that made his name online, and he was hired to write for network TV the year he graduated.

Which comedian hired Donald Glover as a TV writer at 23 and later wrote his Time 100 tribute?

Tina Fey gave Glover his first writing job on her NBC sitcom 30 Rock, and she later popped up as a guest on one of his mixtapes.

Donald Glover played an astrodynamicist who helps rescue a stranded astronaut in which 2015 film?

The Martian, directed by Ridley Scott, stars Matt Damon as the stranded astronaut, and was one of three films Glover appeared in that year.

Donald Glover and Maya Erskine play spies in a 2024 Prime Video series inspired by which 2005 film?

Mr. & Mrs. Smith was co-created by Glover, who married his partner Michelle White while making it and went straight back to work the same day.

Donald Glover auditioned in 2008 to play which public figure on a sketch show, a role Fred Armisen got?

The Barack Obama part went to Armisen instead, but Glover returned to the same show a decade later as both host and musical guest.

In Donald Glover's FX series Atlanta, Earn manages his cousin Alfred, who raps under which stage name?

Paper Boi is played by Brian Tyree Henry, and Glover has likened the show's loose, surreal episodes to short stories.

Donald Glover became the first Black winner of which comedy Emmy category for the FX series Atlanta?

Directing was the category that made history, and he also took home the lead actor Emmy for the same show.

Donald Glover built a YouTube following from 2006 as a member of which sketch group?

Derrick Comedy picked its name because, like members Donald, Dominic and Dan, it starts with a D; the group went on to make the film Mystery Team.

At which 2017 music festival did Donald Glover first announce he would retire the Childish Gambino name?

Governors Ball heard the news as his parting words on stage, yet the name lasted another seven years and two more albums.

Before Childish Gambino, Donald Glover made electronic music as mcDJ, remixing the album Illinois by which artist?

Sufjan Stevens made the 2005 album he reworked, and the mcDJ name lives on as a label credit on This Is America.

Childish Gambino scored his first UK top ten hit with a guest verse on Trouble, a 2012 single by whom?

Leona Lewis took the song to number seven in Britain, six years before Gambino had a top ten hit of his own in America.

Donald Glover's planned FX animated series about which Marvel character was cancelled over creative differences?

Deadpool never reached the screen, so Glover posted an unproduced script online to prove he had not been too busy to write it.

Donald Glover voices which Nintendo character in the 2026 animated film The Super Mario Galaxy Movie?

Yoshi, hatched from an egg in Brooklyn, befriends the Mario brothers in the film, with Glover joining a cast that includes Jack Black.