Lakeith Stanfield Reunites With Boots Riley for I Love Boosters
lakeith stanfield is back in Boots Riley’s orbit, and the reunion gives I Love Boosters an immediate industry hook. Stanfield spoke about the project in an Esquire interview while his career now spans film, television, music, one Oscar nomination, and three children.
Stanfield had already been profiled in 2018, when he was 26 and had appeared in Short Term 12, Get Out, Atlanta, and Sorry to Bother You. That history matters here because the new interview frames his next move as a continuation of a partnership that began with a radical black comedy that premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2018.
Boots Riley and Sundance 2018
Sorry to Bother You premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2018, giving Riley and Stanfield a shared reference point before I Love Boosters entered the picture. Esquire asked to talk to him again on the cusp of that reunion, which places the new film inside a working relationship that already has a proven launchpad.
Stanfield said, “In every character, you find parts of you.” That line fits the way he has been discussed for years: as an actor who keeps shifting shape without losing the thread of his own persona. Jonathan Anderson put it more bluntly in an email, writing, “He’s an actor’s actor, with a remarkable range, bringing something unexpected and magical to every role.”
January in Los Angeles
In January, Stanfield arrived alone on Esquire’s Los Angeles set and was initially mistaken by the crew for an interloper. He was photographed in oversized floral print shorts, then held an enormous clock for the final shot, a small but telling sign that the profile was built around presence as much as promotion.
He also described his early beginnings in rural California as a young person who felt “like I was much more than what was confined in this body.” That phrasing fits a career that has moved across film, television, and music without settling into one lane.
Kasmere Trice and three kids
Stanfield married model Kasmere Trice in 2023, and by the time of the interview he had three kids. Those details place the I Love Boosters reunion inside a version of his career that is no longer about emergence alone; it is about what he chooses to do with the range he already has.
For readers tracking Stanfield as an industry figure, the immediate takeaway is simple: he is pairing a broader personal profile with another collaboration from the filmmaker who helped define one of his standout early turns. If I Love Boosters follows the path of their last pairing, this is the kind of project that can keep him in the conversation without forcing him to repeat himself.
