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Ashton Sanders from 'Moonlight' Is Playing RZA in a Show About Wu-Tang

He signed on to star in Hulu's 'Wu-Tang: An American Saga,' executive produced by RZA and Method Man.
Ashton Sanders and RZA
Sanders photo by Dia Dipasupil/Getty Images. RZA image via Gregg DeGuire/Getty Images

Showtime's Wu-Tang Clan documentary, Of Mics and Men, was met with rave reviews when it premiered at Sundance earlier this month, but that four-part limited series is far from the only Wu-Tang film and TV project in the works. Hulu is currently putting together a separate scripted drama focused on the early days of Wu-Tang in 90s Staten Island—and the cast list is already looking stacked.

On Tuesday, Hulu announced that Moonlight's Ashton Sanders, who played teenage Chiron in the film, has signed on to star as RZA in Wu-Tang: An American Saga, Variety reports.

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Sanders will play a young Bobby Diggs (not yet known as the RZA), who is "creative and thoughtful underneath a hardened exterior" and struggles to reconcile his dream of being a musician with his responsibility to his family, per a character description given to Variety.

Siddiq Saunderson—who is set to star in Netflix's modern Jesus story, Messiah, later this year—is also on board to play a 19-year-old Ghostface Killah. Into the Spiderverse's Shameik Moore is rounding out the cast as Sha Rader, RZA's friend and a footsoldier for the drug dealer Power Grant (Marcus Callender). Zolee Griggs and Erika Alexander have also signed on to star.

"Wu-Tang, through our music, has always strove to inspire as we entertain," RZA said back when the Hulu series was first announced. "This opportunity to continue the Wu saga in a ten-episode series will exponentially increase our inspirational style of entertainment. In the immortal words of ODB, 'Wu-Tang is for the Children.'"

RZA co-created and co-wrote the ten-episode drama series with SuperFly's Alex Tse. He'll also executive produce, alongside Tse and Method Man. The show doesn't seem to be in production yet, so it's still too early to know when it'll wind up hitting Hulu, but we'll likely be hearing more about it in the months to come.

All these projects aside, RZA and Ghostface apparently still somehow have the time to collaborate on an upcoming horror movie about a Staten Island serial killer called Angel of Dust—so get ready for Wu-Tang to invade all of your screens in 2019.

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