Donald Glover claims he was a “diversity” hire on NBC’s “30 Rock.”
The multi-hyphenate performer told GQ in an interview published Tuesday that the comedy show’s creator, Tina Fey, admitted to Glover that he was hired in part of a diversity initiative.
“There is no animosity between us or anything like that, but [Tina Fey] said it herself… It was a diversity thing,” the actor said.
In a 2018 profile with the New Yorker, Glover emphasized that, during a conversation with Fey, while she expressed her admiration for the “This is America” rapper, but said she hired him because funding from NBC’s Diversity Initiative “made [Glover] free.”
Tina Fey’s reps did not immediately respond to Page Six’s request for comment.
Glover, 39, landed a writing gig on the Emmy-winning comedy show — which ran from 2006 to 2013 — when he was just 23 years old.
Tracy Morgan, who played Tracy Jordan on the show, told GQ that the young writer’s “very funny” work even got Morgan nominated for a couple awards.
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Glover also shared that he later discovered the job position was between him and “Black-ish” creator Kenya Barris.
“I didn’t know it was between me and him until later. He hit me one day and he was like, ‘I hated you for years!’” Glover said.
However, the Grammy Award-winning artist revealed that his nerves were less than eased when he got the job.
“It definitely didn’t feel like I was supposed to be there,” Glover said to GQ.
“I used to have stress dreams every night where I was doing cartwheels on the top of a New York skyscraper with the other writers watching me.”
Glover would later transition to work on-camera in 2009 in the comedy show “Community,” but his notoriety skyrocketed in 2016 with his hit show “Atlanta.”
He went on to win awards in both music and television, securing Critic’s Choice awards and Golden Globes awards for “Atlanta,” as well as multiple Grammys for hits such as “This is America” and “Redbone.”
