When it's time for Issa Rae to become Issa Dee, the transformation starts around the eyes. They get more incredulous—as if in alarm at the sheer number of awkward moments a person can encounter in the span of a single scene, or an entire life. On the set of HBO's Insecure, which Rae co-created and stars in, she is confident: in charge. But then it's time for a new take, and the change into Rae's on-screen alter ego—slightly more hapless, significantly more broke—begins. The coat, sweatpants, and slippers she uses to stay warm on air-conditioned sets come off, the sense of competence that otherwise envelops her fades, and the eyes begin to search, somewhat desperately, for the solid ground of purpose that Issa Rae has, and Issa Dee most definitely does not.

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Today, on a blue white hazy afternoon, Insecure has taken over a nightclub in the Mid-City area of Los Angeles, a block south of the 10 freeway. Rae, who is 33 and grew up about four miles from here, in View Park-Windsor Hills, is scrupulous about representing the L.A. she knows. Over time, she's developed an unofficial rule about where Insecure does and does not shoot, and she avoids going north of the freeway if at all possible. “Growing up here, nobody lives in Hollywood. Nobody lives north of the 10. This is a blanket statement, but most of my friends from L.A. are black and they live south of the 10 or, like, along it, or Mid-City. That's the L.A. that I know, and that's the L.A. that I want to represent and portray.”

Rae had been on set for two weeks, shooting the show's third season, and the stress of managing a cast and crew of a hit show had begun to mount. In the fall, she was nominated for a Golden Globe, for the second time, for her work as an actress on the show. Last year, HBO gave Insecure its ultimate honor: a Sunday-night time slot right after Game of Thrones. Rae is often described as the first black woman to create and star in a premium-cable series—a compliment so specific that it tends to make her feel entirely misunderstood, if not insulted. (“I mean, who cares? I'm gonna be next to, what, Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King?”) It might be more accurate to say Rae is part of a vanguard of young creators making television in ways that television hasn't quite been made before—raunchier, realer, less beholden to the demands of a mass audience.

Insecure, which is about the lives of a handful of young black women and men in various stages of their careers (including: not really having careers), takes delight in the comedy of everyday existence: passive-aggressive co-workers (“Issa, what's ‘on fleek’ ”?), the advice of well-intentioned but slightly confused confidants (“You got to fuck a lot of frogs to get a good frog”), the adrenaline rush of doing the wrong thing. The show, built around the Issa character's friendships (most notably with a lawyer named Molly, played by Yvonne Orji) and romantic stumbles (often with her ex, Lawrence, played by Jay Ellis), depends less on any kind of linear plot and more on the types of confusing yet vivid encounters that pile up in one's 20s and 30s. (In the second season, Issa describes a recent sexual encounter as a “nebulous fuck.”)